
Class _J-_-6/^ 



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JESSE HAWKS, M.D. 



CAHABA. 



A STORY OF 



CAPTIVE BOYS IN BLUE 



/ 



JESSE HAWES, M.D., 

GREELEY, COL., 
Formerly of gxH III. Cav. 



NEW YORK: 
BURR PRINTING HOUSE, 

i8 Jacob Street. 



lo452 



COPYRIGHT, i888, BY JESSE HAWES. 



v' r^ 



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ERRATA. 

Page 71, line 18, for "your" read "our." 
" 259, " 16, " " Beevvet " read " Barrett." 
" 411, " 25, omit " more." 



^0 t!)e (ttomtatres 



Who sweltered in the tropical heat of summer and shivered in the cold rains of winter, 

whose days were passed in hunger and whose dreams were of food : who 

endured the plagues of smoke and vermin and disease : who at last, 

for nearly two days, stood knee deep in cold water, yet 

never for a moment faltered in their devotion to 

their country nor permitted a murmur 

against its motives or its 

methods, this 

volume is 

^ffectionatels Z3tT»icatetr 

By one who recalls the memory of such men with pride and 
tenderness. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

INTRODUCTORY xiii 

CHAPTER I. 

Cahaba, the First Capital of Alabama, a Centre of Cul- 
ture, Wealth, and Energy — Its Natural Advantages 
— The Removal of the Capital, Followed by the 
Decay of the Town — Its Condition To-Day i 

CHAPTER II. 

Castle Morgan — An Old Cotton Shed, Dilapidated and 
Unused — Named for the Kentucky Raider — Its Di- 
mensions — Report of Confederate Surgeon Whit- 
field UPON its Crowded Condition and its Abominable 
Water — The Confederate Inspector-General Chil- 
ton ALSO Enters a Complaint Regarding the Manage- 
ment AND Abuses of the Prison — Inmates of the Pris- 
on WHEN THE Author Entered — Majority Captured 
from the Command of Sturgis 12 

CHAPTER III. 

Military Operations in the Southwest — Sherman— Sooy 
Smith — Banks — Sturgis — Battle of Guntown — The 
Wretched Criminal Management of Sturgis Insures 
Defeat 22 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Experience of a Wounded Man on the Retreat from 
Guntown — Recaptured— Sent to Mobile and Cahaba. 34 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER V. 

PAGE 

The Defeat of Sturgis a Bitter Surprise to Every One— 
A. J. Smith Sent Against Forrest — The Enemy Met at 
Pontotoc — Charge of a Portion of the Ninth Illinois 
Cavalry Against Three Confederate Brigades — Cap- 
ture of Author 55 

CHAPTER VI. 

Confederates Deceived as to the Number of their As- 
sailants — Taken to the Confederate Commander — 
The Provost Guard 65 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Provost Guard Proceed to Take an Inventory of 
the Prisoner's Personal Property— He Receives Many 
Undesirable Attentions— Remarkable Instinct of 
the Average Provost Guard— Another "Boy in Blue" 
— Misery Loves Company— Taken to the Rear of the 
Battlefield of Tupelo 79 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Hundreds of Empty Saddles— The Wounded Texan— His 
Order to Sergeant Teer — Major Morgan Forwarded 
to Okolona— The Autocratic Boy Guards 95 

CHAPTER IX. 

From Okolona to Meridian — The One Day in Nine 
Months when Our Mess had Enough Food — A Runa- 
way Negro — J. J. Fitzpatrick— Ordered to Selma, Ala. 107 

CHAPTER X. 

Plans for Escape— Sent to Cahaba — Searched for Valu- 
ables — In Castle Morgan — " What Do You Hear 
About Exchange?" nS 

CHAPTER XI. 

Under the Water-Closet and Over the Stockade— A 
Hard Day's March Ahead of Us— Wading in the Ala- 
bama—Down TO Business j 26 



CONTENTS. IX 

CHAPTER XII. 

PAGE 

An Unwelcome Spectator— Climbing Trees to Escape — 
FROM Hounds — A False Alarm — An Involuntary Bath 
—Seeking Lodgings— Swimming the Creek — The Negro 
Overseer—" You— u," "You — u" 135 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Running from the Dogs— Recaptured— Garrulous Old 
Hatcher — Identified — The Instinct of Fiends Pos- 
sessed BY the Hounds — Returned to Cahaba 143 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Castle Morgan Unknown — Reasons for its Retired Posi- 
tion in History and Tradition — In Many Particulars 
THE Worst Prison in the Confederacy — Compared 

WITH AnDERSONVILLE I $2 

CHAPTER XV. 

Loss of the Sultana — A Major Portion of her Passengers 
from Castle Morgan — Only Four Great Battles in 
WHICH the Union Loss in Killed was Greater — Per- 
sonal Narratives 163 

CHAPTER XVI. 

Food at Castle Morgan — Decayed Beef— Poor Quality of 
Meal — A Confederate Inspector-General is Indig- 
nant AT THE Food Furnished to Captives There— Re- 
port of Confederate Inspector-General Chandler — 
He Calls Attention to the Abundance of Food — Re- 
menyi Eclipsed— Rats— Lice 200 

CHAPTER XVII. 

" Muggers" and Thieves— A Police Court Formed— Wil- 
liam Rea, a Citizen Prisoner, Made Police Judge 219 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

Andrew J, Conn, the Sheriff — A Sketch of Himself and 
Family— Pat Kelly — " Perry" — Tom Hassett — The 
Special Exchange , 228 



X CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

FAGB 

A New Arbiter— A Desirable Autocrat—" Big Tennes- 
see"— His Collision with the Muggers— A Thorn in 
Their Flesh 245 

CHAPTER XX. 

Colonel Howard Henderson, the Commissioner of Ex- 
change — Colonel Samuel Jones, Commander of the 
Prison — A Coward at Vicksburg — Cashiered and Sent 
to Cahaba to Command Castle Morgan 252 

CHAPTER XXI. 

The Guards at Castle Morgan— The Modern River Styx 
— The Author's Life Spared by an Old Conscript — 
Hankins— He Kills Three Men in Six Days—" Little 
Charley" — Mrs. Amanda Gardner ... 261 

CHAPTER XXIL 

Sent to Meridian— Gere — Unable to Walk — A Biped Bur- 
ro — E VERY-DAY Life at Meridian 276 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

Ordway's Attempt at Escape and His Punishment— Es- 
cape OF Conn, Buffington, and their Comrades — 
Trenaman's Narrative 285 

CHAPTER XXIV. 
Trenaman's Narrative Continued 300 

CHAPTER XXV. 
The Story of Buffington's Escape 313 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

EvERY-DAY Life at Meridian — " Raiding" the Conscripts — 
Digging a Tunnel— Thirty-nine Escaped— All Recap- 
tured OR Killed — The Misfortunes of the Refugees. 332 



CONTENTS. XI 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

PAGE 

Natty — Stewart Axley — George Robinson — Sergeant 
Nichols Sent Back to Castle Morgan 341 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Cold Weather at Cahaba— Condition of the Men — In an 
Atmosphere of Gloom — Confederate Reports Sent 
in to Prison — Recruiting for the Confederate States 
Army — Not a Success 350 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

A Company of Thieves and Muggers Enlist— Good Rid- 
dance — Frank Stanley Takes the Oath to Save His 
Life — For His Mother's Sake 361 

CHAPTER XXX. 

Sergeant Owens — Escapes and is Recaptured — Begins a 
Tunnel — Tediousness of the Task 373 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

Captain Hanchette — Personal Appearance and History 
— Entrance to Castle Morgan — Suggests a Plan for 
Escape— His Lieutenants— Mart Becker— Culp — Col- 
lins—Rush 382 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

Jacob W. Rush — A Rough Joke is the Means of His Being 
Among the Conspirators — Sergeant Dillon, of Ninth 
Illinois Cavalry— D. M. Maxon, of Second Michigan 
Cavalry — How Men Faced What Seemed Almost Cer- 
tain Death 393 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 

A Conference— Organizing the Conspirators— Difficul- 
ties OF THE Scheme — The Assault Made 403 

CHAPTER XXXIV. 

Rigney — His Connection with the Insurrection an Acci- 
dent — A Confederate's Bravery — Three Days of Fast- 
ing — Searching for the Leaders 417 



Xll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XXXV. 

PAGE 

Arrest of Mart Becker— Hanchette Betrayed— His Hero- 
ic Demeanor— Refuses to Become an Informer to 
Save his Own Life— His Death at the Hands of Col- 
onel Jones 431 

CHAPTER XXXVI. 

After the Insurrection — Jones —Brewer — The Flood — 
Incidents Laughable, Sad, Barbarous 442 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 

Still in the Water— Drinking Fluid Pollution— Eating 
Raw Meal— Nearly All Sick— Is it a Parole ?— Leav- 
ing the Worst Prison of the Confederacy 452 

CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

Leave your Blankets — At Selma — Five ^Dollars ■ for an 
Egg— Jackson, Miss. — Crossing Black River— Under 
the Stars and Stripes — Farewell to Comrades 463 



INTRODUCTORY. 



NO war of modern times has been more important 
to the people engaged in it, to their present 
and especially their future, than our war of the Rebel- 
lion. No war was ever so productive of histories and 
narratives by its participants, and it is equally certain 
that no histories or reminiscences are so eagerly read 
by the people of our country as are those based upon 
our great conflict of a quarter of a century ago. 

Every chapter that can throw any light upon the 
actors and scenes of those disturbed and anxious 
times possesses a most fascinating interest to the gen- 
eration that has grown up since the contest ceased, 
as well as to those whose memory extends through 
the whole period of its existence. 

A truthful index of this feeling is the fact that the 
most rapid growth made by any large periodical 
in America dates from the time of its entering upon 
the publication of a series of articles written by the 
most prominent Federal and Confederate leaders and 
devoted to the actions in which they took a part. 



XIV IN TR OD UC TOR V. 

To satisfy this intellectual hunger and thirst for 
information, a history of every large army has been 
written, a chronicle of every important campaign, a 
narration of every prominent battle. Reminiscences 
of several of the great prisons of the South and North 
have appeared, and have been of the most absorbing 
interest. The consideration given to the history of 
our country should be regarded with pleasure by 
every patriotic person, for a knowledge of history 
teaches patriotism. Those who cherished a strong 
regard for the unity and perpetuity of our nation 
before its life was so seriously threatened have es- 
teemed it of greater value since — its value has been 
enhanced by its cost. Every life sacrificed, every limb 
lost, every hour of pain or anguish, every day passed 
in the gloom of the prison by those who sought to 
preserve the nation from destruction, made it of more 
value to its admirers, and a record of the facts are a 
proper sequel to the facts themselves. 

One large prison of the Confederacy, so far, has 
been but barely mentioned — that at Cahaba (pro- 
nounced Ca-ha\v-bah), Ala. In a report upon the 
prisons of the Confederacy, made by a Congressional 
committee shortly after the close of the Rebellion, less 
than five pages are to be found relative to Cahaba, 
and of these the greater part are transcribed reports 
from Confederate archives. 

To fill in this important chapter in the history 



IN TROD UCTOR Y. XV 

of the great struggle for the preservation of the Union 
is the object of this volume. Incidentally, the pages 
following are an humble monument to the endurance, 
the patience, the fortitude, the unswerving loyalty and 
patriotism of that class of men who, numerically, con- 
stituted the great mass of the army — its non-com- 
missioned officers and privates. 

The virtues and courage and intellect and strategy 
of our leaders have been painted in the brightest 
colors (though, in the estimation of us, their followers, 
none too bright), and we would add to, not detract 
from their fame, so richly merited. But the heroism, 
endurance, and steadfastness of those humbler actors 
in the great drama — that fearful tragedy — have never 
been so conspicuously portrayed. The sacrifice made 
by them, by reason of their youth on entering the ser- 
vice, was often incalculable in amount. A large 
quota of their numbers left the school-room to don 
the blue of the soldier. Had they been older, the 
foundation by education for a more useful life had 
been laid, and their losses from this source less. It 
was a great sacrifice to exchange the four years 
planned to be passed in college for the four years in 
military camps. It was a sacrifice, too, of no small 
amount to give up for a time one's personal identity. 
The civil law regards one man as the equal of another 
and every man a sovereign ; military law compels the 
private soldier to become an unreasoning part of a 



XVI IN TR OD UC TOR V. 

great machine, known by a number, not to think — to 
do as ordered only. 

"Theirs not to make reply, 
Theirs not to reason why, 
Theirs but to do and die." 

When captivity became the common lot of the sol- 
dier with rank and the soldier without, the com- 
missioned chieftain was given his parole and granted 
a semi-freedom, while his humbler followers were hur- 
ried to the stockade and guarded enclosure already 
crowded. 

These facts are recalled in no spirit of fault-finding 
or hateful cynicism ; they were inevitable and could 
not be changed ; not even the humblest, thoughtful 
private should for a moment wish them changed ; but 
a recollection of these" facts fills us with gratitude 
toward those who so patiently bore their self-imposed 
burdens, and the glow of an honest pride may properly 
flush the cheek of him who, as a boy or man, was the 
private soldier twenty-five years ago. 

The intelligent private soldier early in his military 
life knew what captivity implied to him, and any 
record which truthfully tells of how he bore its ills, 
with not a murmur against his Government, with no 
thought of deserting his standard, when the induce- 
ments for doing so were so great, is a worthy monu- 
ment to his steadfastness and an index of the stern 



INTR OD UC TOR Y. X V 1 1 

Stuff of which the common soldiers of our army were 
composed. 

We would emphatically assert that the story of 
misery and wretchedness and long suffering, which 
necessarily is a prominent feature in the history of any 
prison, is not intended to awaken the animosities of 
other times. Such an object, even if desired, can never 
be and should never be attained. " The war is over," 
and with the great majority of those who in it were 
actors, North and South, I trust — as it is with the 
writer of this — the spirit of vengeance is dead, and has 
been so long buried as to have changed to something 
nobler. 

This is simply history, with no partisan object, no 
vindictive purpose, no desire to reflect upon the hon- 
esty of purpose of the great masses of people who 
offered their lives in defence of the doctrine of State 
Rights. The results of the war, the logic of events, 
the strong personal friendships and high esteem grown 
up between a multitude of individuals who were for- 
merly contestants, the long years that have elapsed, 
have rendered acrimonious discussion out of place. 
The men of the North and South who risked 7nost in 
the great war have little desire to fight over the battles 
of their younger days. The majority of the Southern 
men who were "in the trenches" I believe are satisfied, 
some perhaps are even glad, that their efforts were not 
crowned with success ; and while their average North- 



XVill INTRODUCTORY. 

ern former adversary does not underestimate the gran- 
deur of the cause for which he fought, he is glad to 
meet them more than half way on the plane of recon- 
ciliation, and hopes the future shall see both " touch- 
ing elbows " in the work of building up a great and 
noble nation. 







^ *-' V! 



C A H A B A. 



CHAPTER I. 

CAHABA, THE FIRST CAPITAL OF ALABAMA, A CENTRE 

OF CULTURE, WEALTH, AND ENERGY ITS NATURAL 

ADVANTAGES THE REMOVAL OF THE CAPITAL, 

FOLLOWED BY THE DECAY OF THE TOWN ITS 

CONDITION TO-DAY. 

A HISTORY of Cahaba can be now written 
which shall embrace its whole life, for within the 
Span of this century it has arisen, flourished, and de- 
cayed. Cahaba to-day is a city of the past — only ruins 
are left to mark its site. 

Sixty-eig'ht years ago, when the State of Alabama 
was admitted into the Union, a site for the capital 
was selected on the west bank of the Alabama River, 
a hundred and thirty miles northeast from Mobile, 
fifty miles southwest from Montgomery. This place, 
situated at the point where the Alabama and Cahaba 

rivers unite, was called Cahaba. It was also made 

I 



2 CAHABA. 

the seat of Dallas County, a vast fertile territory of 
nine hundred and fifty square miles. Here were ele- 
ments of prosperity — two navigable rivers, a great rich 
country, and a delightful climate. Cahaba was fast to 
improve. Streets were laid out, pavements put down, 
a State-house, Governor's mansion, court-house, and 
jail erected. Residences, business houses, hotels, ware- 
houses, schools, churches, a Masonic lodge -room, thea- 
tre, and bank followed in rapid succession. Artesian 
wells were bored and bridges built, and a railroad and 
telegraph added to the grandeur of the brilliant young 
capital. Accomplished professors, doctors of divinity, 
skilled physicians, profound lawyers, astute politicians, 
gifted editors, and live merchants sprang up, as if Ca- 
haba was the creature of Aladdin's lamp. And there 
were typical planters with scores of plantations and 
thousands of slaves worth millions of money. Here 
came ambitious senators and representatives from all 
parts of the State to make laws and perform other and 
various duties for their country's good, and learned 
lawyers to further their clients' causes in the State 
courts. Society people came to enjoy the pleasures of 
the place. Gorgeous carriages with liveried servants 
sped along the streets bearing occupants dressed in 
" purple and fine linen." Grand balls and luxuriant 
banquets succeeded each other. Massive wagons, 
groaning under the weight of plantation products, 
poured in from every direction ; palatial steamers dis- 



BRILLIANT CAHABA. 3 

charged cargoes of rich merchandise at the wharf, and 
went away loaded down with cotton. 

Cahaba grew to be five thousand strong, and a cen- 
tre of politics, of law, of learning, of religion, of trade, 
of agriculture, and of fashion. Cahaba had a proud 
career for forty years — flashed upon the world like a 
meteor, rushed along a blazing path, and passed away 
forever. 

Cahaba's bar was an enviable one. In its early days 
were such prominent men as Reuben Safford, sixteen 
years on the Supreme Bench, and finally Chief Jus- 
tice ; Horatio G. Perry, Judge of the Circuit Court 
and State Senator ; G. W. Gayle, United States Dis- 
trict-Attorney and member of the House ; Jesse 
Beene, member of the House ; Robert S. Hatcher, 
Senator and member of the House ; George R. Evans, 
member of the House; and Colonel Lawrence E. 
Dawson, one of the brightest men in the State. Later 
along was the distinguished William L. Yancey, mem- 
ber of Congress, framer of the articles of secession, 
Confederate Minister to Great Britain, and member of 
the Confederate Senate. And along with him were 
C. C. Pegues, Colonel of the Fifth Alabama Infantry, 
killed at Gaines Mill, Va. ; John S. Hunter, Judge of 
the Circuit Court, member of the House and of the 
Senate, and an orator of considerable note ; P. P. 
Wood, present Judge of the Probate Court ; Briga- 
dier-General John Tyler Morgan, now United States 



4 CAHABA. 

Senator; Judge James L. Evans, Thomas J. Portis, 
Jay Gould's attorney in St. Louis; Judge B. F. Saf- 
fold, of the Supreme Court ; Colonel David S. Troy, 
now of the Montgomery bar ; Judge Raynor, Briga- 
dier-General Edmund W. Pettus, C. A. S., and Col- 
onel N. PL R. Dawson, late Speaker of the Alabama 
House of Representatives. The last two mentioned 
were partners, and are now practising together in 
Selma. General Pettus will be remembered in con- 
nection with the fall of Vicksburg. Colonel Dawson 
married a daughter of the late Robert S. Todd, of 
Lexington, Ky., and in consequence was a brother-in- 
law of President Lincoln and of General Benjamin 
Hardin Helm. 

Among the physicians were the learned Dr. E. G. 
Ulmer, who wrote a valuable work on malaria, and the 
equally able Drs. Hustis and Enghsh, and Dr. Thomas 
Casey, nine years a State Senator. Dr. Saltmarsh was 
a wealthy citizen and Register of the Land Office. 

The list of opulent planters embraced Joel E. Mat- 
thews, who owned one thousand slaves and was \Vorth 
more than one million dollars ; his brother, Charles L. 
Matthews, a millionaire, and two other brothers, both 
of whom were wealthy; Hon. Robert S. Hatcher, and 
many others. 

Edward M. Perine was the merchant prince of the 
place, but Colonel Samuel M. Hill and others occu- 
pied high rnercantile positions. 



HER EMINENT CITIZENS. 5 

The ministry did not suffer in comparison with the 
other professions and other callings. Dr. Smythe was 
a prominent Presbyterian divine, and Rev. J. L. Cot- 
ton stood high in the Methodist pulpit. The well- ^ 
known George F. Cushman, D.D., now of New 
York, was rector of the Episcopal Church. This 
church was erected after plans by Mr. Upjohn, a New 
York architect ; had stained-glass windows and a fine 
organ. The first church built in Cahaba was the Pan- 
theon, in which all denominations worshipped, but 
was early succeeded by Presbyterian, Methodist, and 
Episcopal churches. The Female Academy cost 
twenty thousand dollars. Of the several newspapers, 
the Dallas Gazette ranked highest; and Hon. Jesse 
Beene and Hon. William L. Yancey were the fore- 
most editors. 

Frederick Wolfe was a resident of Cahaba — he is 
now the manager of the powerful Ehrlanger railroad 
■ syndicate in the United States. 

The residences of Cahaba were, many of them, 
costly ones. The Crocheron House cost ten thousand 
dollars, the Barker House twenty thousand dollars, 
and the Ferine mansion fifty-five or sixty thousand dol- 
lars. These three yet stand, but a number of other 
important ones have been pulled down. 

An artesian well in the yard of the Ferine house is 
twelve inches in diameter and eight hundred feet 
deep. It was a wonder in its day, spouting like the 



6 CAHABA. 

Beehive geyser of Yellowstone Park. Sir Charles 
Lyell, the geologist, made a visit to Cahaba to see 
this well, while on a tour of the United States ; and 
Millard Fillmore also came to see it. This well was 
bored for a factory, but the idea of a factory was 
abandoned. It yet flows, as also does a smaller one 
near it. 

The Dallas Hotel ranked with the best in the 
South. 

The telegraph line was the first erected in the State. 
It came from Mobile and continued to Montgomery. 
The people of Selma, eight miles distant, were for 
years compelled to come here to send a telegram. 

Seven years had scarcely elapsed when the capital 
was removed. Railroads were built that cut off her 
support. Selma grew up and drew away much of Ca- 
• haba's business and population, and even many of the 
fine houses were removed thither. The city dwindled 
to a lifeless village, and as such the war of 1861 found 
it. A slightly increased activity was given it in 
1863, when the old brick cotton shed of Colonel 
Samuel M. Hill was transformed into a prison for cap- 
tured Federals, and a small body of Confederate 
troops were stationed there as prison guards. 

It remained the county seat of Dallas County, 
however, until 1866, when that prestige was taken 
from it and removed, like so many others pre- 
ceding it, to Selma; then the last vestige of 



CAHABA TO- DA V. y 

its former splendor and activity departed. To-day- 
only two or three poor white families and a few 
negroes are the representatives of Alabama's first 
capital. 

Let us visit it to-day — twenty-two years after 
the close of the war. 

Here we are at the crossing of Main and First 
streets. Look around you. See yon broken columns 
and shattered pilasters like unto ancient Thebes ? 
The grass, the briers, and the weeds grow in the 
streets and the pavements are sunken. Here on the 
corner is a little store, and another small one kept by 
a blind man. Across there is a corn-mill in the court- 
house, and this is all there is of Cahaba's business. 
Perhaps two dozen people in all are left of that 
splendid array of five thousand that lived here in the 
long ago. But behold the remainder of that block. 
Look at the long row of closed doors and barred 
shutters. Those counters and shelves within that 
once held costly wares and fabrics now hold but dust. 
Those stairways that led up to offices of profound 
jurists and able journalists are vacant and decayed. 
Turn your eyes to the other side of the street. A 
mass of debris / 

There stands a lazy mule, with ragged saddle, in 
front of what was once a merchant's palace, where of 
old were wont to stand royal carriages with spirited 
teams. Now let us walk down Main Street. On the 



8 CAHABA. 

left there is the court-house. It has grown old. An 
ugly smoke-stack protrudes from the roof. Where 
the gifted sons of Solon, Justinian, and Blackstone 
discharged volumes of forensic lore at inteUigent ju- 
ries, and grave judges sat with solemn mien, now 
harshly whir the noisy wheels. That rubbish in the 
rear is what remains of a strong jail. Let us proceed. 
Here in the street is an artesian well, still pouring 
forth its water. Taste of the water ; 'tis mawkish and 
sulphurous ; it suggests that even the crust of earth 
beneath the dead city is stricken with decay. On the 
corner here to the right you can see a faint trace of 
the famous Dallas Hotel. What broad proportions ! 
But its towering form, pompous proprietor, tapestried 
halls, glittering plate, white-aproned servants, and 
crowds of guests are gone. Out on Second Street, 
there you see the theatre in process of demolition ; 
and the Masonic lodge-room is soon to share the 
same fate. Now we go farther. Here is a man 
ploughing in an old yard. In that yard once stood 
the pretentious residence of Dr. Ulmer, the skilled 
surgeon. Over on the left you see a grove of cedars. 
Among them stood the Episcopal Church, a model of 
architectural beauty. It has been removed — taken 
away to a distant village. Now we come to the grass- 
grown grade of the railroad. The depot down by the 
wharf is no more ; the telegraph line pulled down, the 
ties rotted, the trestle-work fallen, and the rails hauled 



A PALACE IN RUINS. 9 

to Other fields. Yes, six or eight miles of the track, 
out to the junction westward, were literally torn up 
and that much of the road abandoned. An old blind 
horse nips scanty grass where the iron horse used to 
rush along. 

A few steps more and we have reached the site of 
the State-house. Long years ago it was pulled down. 
Listen to the weird clank of that old cowbell where 
once poured forth the enchanting notes of the silvery- 
tongued orators. What a fall was there ! what a leap 
from the sublime to the ridiculous ! 

But we pass on by a tumbled-down school-house, by 
ruins and remains, by those stately pines, along that 
avenue of oaks, over yon viaduct and into the spacious 
grounds that surround the stately edifice that looms 
up like some castle on the Rhine. It is the Ferine 
mansion, a place once owned by a merchant prince, 
who, stripped of fortune and of friends, now clerks in 
a store elsewhere on a precarious salary, while his 
castle is owned by Eastern creditors. We are at the 
gate ; but oh, what a change from the palace that was 
reared within the memory of that old white-haired 
negro who is dozing and smoking in the cool shade 
yonder. The fence is dilapidated, the gate creaks 
sullenly ajar, the drives and walks, once pebbled, 
curbed, and hedged, are now but dim outlines in the 
weeds. The holly, the pomegranate, the mock-orange, 
the myrtle, and the magnolia are overwhelmed by 



lO CAHABA.' 

baser growths. We reach the door and stand on the 
broken pavement before the moss-grown marble 
steps, at the foot of the ivy-clung, balconied tower. 
We ascend the steps and touch the pearl-handled bell 
that you may hear its musical tones, for there is none 
to answer it. We enter. What vacancy, what silence ! 
How hollow our footsteps reverberate through the 
frescoed halls ! Rooms, rooms, a labyrinth of rooms ! 
Come into the parlor — a grand double parlor with 
sixteen hundred square feet of floor, divided by fold- 
ing-doors, Corinthian columns, and panels of exquisite 
workmanship. Look upon these lovely marble man- 
tels carved in Italy, and glance up at the beautiful 
ceilings. Within these gay walls, upon this expanse 
of floor, the devotees of Terpsichore moved to the vo- 
luptuous swell of an orchestra's music. Friends of the 
owner came by the score and remained by the week, 
as was the Southern custom, for in those days he 
" bore a bounteous purse." Now we go through corri- 
dors, by niches, nooks, alcoves, and colonnades to the 
rear portico. The light streams in through the 
ground-glass panes as we approach the door. A 
friendly ash stretches its limbs half across the portico. 
We pause to glance at the waters from the mammoth 
artesian w^ell as they meander down a serpentine 
outlet through what was once a handsome flower- 
garden. The flower-pit, so empty, seems like a de- 
serted tomb. There stand the servants' quarters and 



A SCENE OF DESOLA TION. I I 

carriage-house and stables. But let us re-enter and 
wend our way into the dining-hall and into the pan- 
tries, where were stored the luxuries of a lordly table. 
All are deserted. There goes an owl through a 
broken window and here clings a bat. There in the 
kitchen is the gigantic range still intact. Now must 
we find our way up one of the several stairways, 
through numerous chambers, over piles of plaster 
fallen from decayed ceilings, and go into the tower. 
Now by a flight of steps we climb higher, where 
twelve massive chimneys with gilded rods rear 
their proud forms like giant guardians with spears. 
Up, up to the tower's top. Grand but melancholy 
view ! The placid Alabama " goes on forever," but 
her proud steamers know no longer the wharf. The 
deep and sullen Cahaba runs yet the same, but its 
bridge is down. Spires and towers and domes point 
heavenward, but their bells are hushed. Churches and 
schools and residences and storehouses stand there as 
of yore, but their once bright roofs are dull with rust. 
Streets and drives and walks are visible, but no one 
moves therein. 

Such is Cahaba to-day. 

Cahaba is dead. Will a day of resurrection ever 
come to her? 

To one who visited the place but recently am I in- 
debted for a picture of her in her loneliness. 



CHAPTER II. 

CASTLE MORGAN AN OLD COTTON SHED, DILAPIDATED 

AND UNUSED NAMED FOR THE KENTUCKY RAIDER 

ITS DIMENSIONS — REPORT OF CONFEDERATE SUR- 
GEON WHITFIELD UPON ITS CROWDED CONDITION 

AND ITS ABOMINABLE WATER THE CONFEDERATE 

INSPECTOR-GENERAL CHILTON ALSO ENTERS A 
COMPLAINT REGARDING THE MANAGEMENT AND 

ABUSES OF THE PRISON INMATES OF THE PRISON 

WHEN THE AUTHOR ENTERED MAJORITY CAP- 
TURED FROM THE COMMAND OF STURGIS. 

WHILE Castle Morgan — the name given to 
the prison at Cahaba, in honor of the dar- 
ing Confederate raider — may have been used in 
emergencies as early as 1862 for the retention of 
small squads of Federal prisoners, I have been able 
to find in the official papers of the Confederate Gov- 
ernment no mention of it earlier than the fall of 1863. 
The idea of locating the great prison of the South at 
Cahaba, Ala., instead of Andersonville, Ga., had been 
advocated by a few Confederate leaders, but at the 
time a location was decided upon, Andersonville was 
the most secure place in the South. 



DESCRIPTION OF CAS TIE MORGAN. 



13 



The prison had been an old cotton and corn shed — 
the property of Colonel Samuel Hill — located but a 
rod or two from the banks of the Alabama River. 

Colonel Hill, in the palmy days of Alabama's first capi- 
tal, had been one of the leading merchants of the city, 
and had used the building in carrying on his lucrative 
business, but for many years previous to the civil war 
Cahaba, as a business centre, had been abandoned. The 
large warehouse was unused, except as a refuge for 
troops of gigantic rats, whose ancestors had kept their 
homes for many years within and beneath the walls of 
the building. 

The walls of the structure were about fourteen feet 
high, thick and strong. A roof at one time had covered 
all portions of it, but the warring elements had stripped 
half of the roof away and had corroded innumerable 
holes through the remainder. It had been so long un- 
used, that there was no incentive to repair the damage 
done by the years of rain and wind and sun. So poor 
were the accommodations it offered to its inmates, that 
as late as March, 1864, the Confederate Surgeon, R. M. 
Whitfield, who was in charge of the prison, in making 
his monthly report to the Medical Director, P. B. 
Scott, M.D., at Demopolis,used the following language : 
" I have the honor to transmit to you with this my 
monthly report. When you know the sanitary con- 
dition of the prison you cannot be surprised at the 
large number of cases reported. A brick wall covered 



14 CAHABA. 

by a leaky roof, with sixteen hundred feet of open 
space in its centre, four open windows, and the earth 
for the floor, constitutes the prison." 

Concerning the size of this building I have found 
in Confederate reports upon prisons a considerable 
discrepancy, and desirous of being exact in the mat- 
ter, a few years ago I wrote to a former inhabitant of 
Cahaba, an ex-Confederate, of whose honor, truth, and 
carefulness there could be no question, requesting that 
a careful measurement of the building should be made, 
and in reply was told that an exact measurement gave 
as its length one hundred and ninety-three (193) feet, 
its breadth one hundred and sixteen (116) feet, meas- 
ured on the outside. I was informed that the build- 
ing had been largely torn down, but of its foundation 
enough remained to leave no question regarding the 
surface it enclosed. 

A little more than one half of the roof remained on 
the building through the last years of the war, and 
while it protected a portion of its inmates from the 
sultry summer's sun it was but an indifferent protec- 
tion in many places from the numerous cold rains of 
winter. 

In the early part of 1864, in February or March, 
five or six large multiple bunks were placed in the 
prison. These, by most of our men, were called not 
bunks, but " roosts," as they presented to their occu- 
pants about the same comforts that dhicken roosts 



CASTLE MORGAN'S '' ROOSTSr I 5 

would give. Each roost consisted of four or five tiers 
of rough boards placed one above the other, with 
spaces between each tier of about thirty inches. The 
upright timbers of the roosts were four inches square, 
ten feet long, and separated from each other about seven 
feet. These upright pieces were fastened to each other 
by cross-pieces, and upon this framework were laid 
the rough boards upon which the men were to sleep. 
There was neither straw nor bedding of any kind. In 
the report of Dr. Whitfield, quoted from above, he states 
that through the winter of 1863 and 1864 the prisoners 
would average about two blankets to each five men, 
but through the following winter this estimate would 
be excessive. Upon each roost, packed like sardines 
in a box, could be stowed away from sixty to eighty 
men, according to the height and length of the roost. 
During the summer of 1864 there were added to the 
number of the roosts enough to make them nine in all, 
and capable of furnishing lying-down room to about 
six hundred persons. During the winter of 1864 and 
1865 the remaining twenty-five hundred made their 
beds upon the ground. 

A subdivision of the prison was made by an L- 
shaped wall in the northeast portion ; this embraced 
about one eighth of the whole prison enclosure, and 
was entirely covered by the leaky roof. In no essen- 
tial respect, however, did this subdivision differ from 
the remainder of the enclosure. Probably when the 



1 6 CAHABA. 

shed was used for mercantile purposes the larger di- 
vision was used for storing cotton, while the smaller 
part was used for storing merchandise less bulky. A 
large opening, perhaps at some time closed by a board 
partition, made the smaller enclosure a portion of the 
larger. There was but one place of entrance to the shed : 
this was on the north side of the building, and had 
been made when the shed was erected sufficiently large 
to permit a great plantation wagon loaded high with 
cotton to enter. 

While the water-supply of Castle Morgan was fairly 
abundant, since it came from an artesian well of the 
town a few blocks away from the prison, it was, un- 
fortunately, warm, of a sweetish taste, and impregnated 
with a sulphur gas (sulphuretted hydrogen), strongly 
suggestive of eggs " too ripe." 

To many of the inmates the water was nauseating 
and cathartic ; if, however, we could have been assured 
of its purity the objections to it would have been 
fewer. Doubtless, the majority of those who drank it 
attributed all bad tastes to the mineral with which it 
was known to be impregnated, but from the report of 
Confederate Surgeon Whitfield, mentioned above, I 
quote the following : " The supply of water for drink- 
ing, cooking, and bathing, as well as for washing, is con- 
veyed from an artesian well along an open street gut- 
ter for two hundred yards, thence under the street into 
the prison. In its course it is subjected to the wash- 



THE HORRIBLE IV A TER SUPPLIED. \ 7 

ings of the hands, feet, faces, and heads of soldiers, citi- 
zens, and negroes ; in it are rinsed buckets, tubs, and 
spittoons of groceries, offices, and hospitals; in it can 
be found the filth from hogs, dogs, cows, and horses, 
and filth of all kinds from the street and other 
sources." 

Further on in his report Surgeon Whitfield takes 
occasion to complain of the inefficiency of the quar- 
termasters at Cahaba, in the following language : "The 
two quartermasters at this post, with only the prison 
and one small hospital to supply, have failed to be 
equal to the task of having this prison supplied with 
good and sufficient wood, water, and bunks, and put- 
ting it in a condition in which it would be moderately 
comfortable, clean, and healthy. It is only useless to 
remark that I have made repeated complaints . . . 
to have these defects remedied." (See Report of R. 
M. Whitfield, Surgeon C. S. A., found in Confederate 
Archives, published in Congressional Report upon 
Prisoners of War to 3d Session of 40th Congress, page 

I was told that after the exposure was made of this 
filthy method of supplying water, a partial remedying of 
the evil was undertaken. I trust it was — it certainly 
needed it — and I wish it could be proven that Sur- 
geon Whitfield was in his reports an exaggerator. 

In a report to Colonel R. H. Chilton, Inspector- 
General C. S, A., made by Lieutenant-Colonel D. T. 



1 8 CAHABA. 

Chandler, on October i6th, 1864, a similar complaint 
is made, from which it appears that the management 
of Castle Morgan did not meet with the approval of 
all Confederate officers. 

The water entered the prison through a covered 
trough, or pipe, passing under the west wall near its 
centre. This trough was covered within the prison 
until it reached nearly the centre, where a ditch a foot 
deep, two or three feet wide, and twenty or thirty feet 
in length, was excavated. Sunk in the ditch were two 
barrels, placed on their ends, separated from each other 
by a few feet, with the upper ends open ; water remained 
in the ditch at all times a foot in depth and in the bar- 
rels was deeper. 

At the east end of the ditch the water again 
entered a covered box, by which it was conveyed 
under the east wall and beneath the water-closet, 
which was placed outside of and against the brick 
wall, but enclosed by the stockade. The water-closet, 
placed against the outside of the prison wall on the 
southeast corner, was about fifteen feet long, eight feet 
wide, and nine feet high, its top covered by a " shed " 
roof — i. c, a roof sloping downward from the brick wall 
to the outer wall of the closet. 

The waste water from the inside of the prison passed 
in an open box beneath the seat of the water-closet, 
and served as a vehicle to carry away the fecal dregs. 
The open box extended only a foot or two beyond the 



THE STOCKADE. 



19 



walls of the privy, then its contents passed in an open 
ditch directly to the river. At the point where the ditch 
passed through the stockade, instead of planks or split 
logs placed close together, as in all other parts of the 
stockade, there were placed vertically small spruce or 
pine saplings, only three or four inches in diameter, of 
the same height as the remainder of the stockade, and 
separated from each other by a space of a few inches. 
This arrangement of the saplings assisted several per- 
sons in escaping over the stockade during the months 
of our confinement. It was possible to climb the sap- 
lings, but it was almost if not wholly impossible to 
climb over the stockade at any other point. The walls 
and floor of the water-closet were planks two inches 
thick, placed close together at the time it was built, 
but shrunken by drying, so that cracks a half inch wide 
existed between the planks. The thickness of the 
planks was the means of saving the life of one of my 
messmates a few weeks after we entered the place. 

When the old cotton shed was built earth was drawn 
into it to level up its floor, and in this way it chanced 
that the surface of the ground enclosed by the privy 
was two or three feet below the earth floor of the 
prison and the plank floor of the privy. This circum- 
stance permitted the escape of the writer and two 
other persons from Castle Morgan a few days after 
their entrance. 

In April, 1864, the stockade about the prison was 



20 CAHABA. 

completed. This was composed mainly of two-inch 
planks placed three feet in the ground and twelve feet 
above ground. On the east, south, and west sides the 
stockade was about twelve to fifteen feet distant from 
the brick wall ; on the north side it was farther away, 
and some time in August this yard, on the north side, 
was enlarged so that from that time after it embraced 
a space about seventy-five by one hundred and forty 
feet. This yard was used only in the day and for the 
purposes of cooking. At night all inmates were re- 
tired to the brick enclosure. Guards were placed on 
the inside of the brick wall, in all numbering about a 
dozen ; one was at the door of the water-closet, whose 
duty it was to see that no person escaped through that 
place, two were at the large door of the main entrance 
during the night, but not there during the day. 

At night one or more was placed between the 
brick wall and the stockade, and one was occasionally 
placed on a remaining portion of the roof, where it 
was easy to watch almost unobserved nearly all trans- 
actions going on among the prisoners. 

Two or three pieces of artillery pushed their forbid- 
ding noses through little openings in the stockade sur- 
rounding the cook-yard, and other pieces were said to 
command the prison from another side. A detail of 
men stood always near the artillery, while a double 
guard and a body of armed men, off duty, were always 
outside the outer gate. 



FIRST EXPERIENCE. 2 1 

Later in the fall a walk was placed about the stock- 
ade on its outer surface near its top, upon which armed 
sentries paced at all hours of the day and night, but 
this addition to its safeguards as a prison was not made 
until after August. 

The writer first saw Castle Morgan July 26th, 1864, 
and found on entering it about three hundred men, 
one half of whom owed their capture to the criminal 
blunder and cowardice of General S. D. Sturgis at the 
time of the '' Guntown Disaster ; " the remainder had 
been captured in an innumerable number of skirmishes 
and small engagements all the way between New Or- 
leans, Mobile, Vicksburg, Memphis, Nashville, and 
Chattanooga. The stories of their capture and experi- 
ences, as related to the writer by many of the prisoners 
in after months, were most interesting and thrilling, 
and if collected in a volume would be more wonderful 
than the vivid imagination of the novelist usually por- 
trays; but while such a collection is not within the scope 
of this volume, as a sample of the experiences of many, 
the writer \\\\\ in the following chapter detail the mat- 
ters that fell under his own observation at the time of 
his capture, and would suggest that they fairly repre- 
sent the experiences of the three hundred who pre- 
ceded him at Castle Morgan. 



CHAPTER III. 

MILITARY OPERATIONS IN THE SOUTHWEST SHER- 
MAN SOOY SMITH BANKS STURGIS — BATTLE OF 

GUNTOWN — THE WRETCHED CRIMINAL MANAGEMENT 
OF STURGIS INSURES DEFEAT. 

TO explain the causes that led up to the expedi- 
tion of General A. J. Smith to Tupelo, Miss., 
July, 1864, upon which expedition it was the ill-fortune 
of the author to be made a captive, let us go back and 
glance at the Confederate and Federal operations in 
the Mississippi Valley during that spring and summer. 

Previous to the middle of July there certainly was 
little for the Federal forces to be proud of An expe- 
dition, under command of General W. Sooy Smith, 
starting from near Memphis, Tenn., moved south 
alonof the Mobile and Ohio Railroad until it arrived 
at West Point, Miss. Its objective point was Meri- 
dian, Miss., nearly one hundred miles farther south, 
where General W. T. Sherman had already arrived 
from Vicksburg. 

On February 20th Smith was met by what he sup- 
posed to be the combined forces of Forrest, S. D. 
Lee, and Chalmers, w^hose numbers he judged to be 



MILITARY OPERATIONS IN THE SOUTHWEST. 



23 



greatly superior to his own and comparatively fresh. 
Feeling himself unable, with his supposed inferior force, 
and encumbered as it was with a large train of negroes 
who had flocked to him, to cope with his adversaries, 
he ordered a retreat. He was new to our command, 
and did not enjoy their confidence. The retreat was at 
first miserably conducted, and at Okolona he lost five 
pieces of artillery, not less than two hundred men as 
prisoners, and came near being totally routed by an 
inferior force. 

Not more brilliant nor cheering to the North was 
the expedition up Red River, in Louisiana, under 
General Banks. 

The operations of General N. B. Forrest in West 
Tennessee and Kentucky, while regarded in the North 
as a display of savagery, were in the South regarded as 
a triumph and a source of satisfaction. 

The Union leaders felt it necessary to inflict some 
chastisement to the Confederate forces to counteract 
the moral effect of our defeats in the West, and an- 
other expedition was started out June 2d, 1864, this 
time from Memphis, under the command of General 
S. D. Sturgis. His infantry and artillery, numbering 
about nine thousand, were composed in part of troops 
that had garrisoned Memphis and vicinity, and in part 
of a portion of the Sixteenth Corps, the remainder of 
which, under its commander. General A. J. Smith, had 
been up Red River in the expedition of General 



24 



CAHABA. 



Banks. The cavalry numbered about fifteen hundred, 
and were under the direct command of General B. H. 
Grierson. To this expedition, which was afterward 
known as " The Sturgis Raid," or " Guntown Diaster," 
the writer will devote more space, as upon his arrival 
at Castle Morgan he found a large per cent of its 
inmates who were compelled to attribute their captiv- 
ity to the wretched management of that expedition. 

This command moved leisurely along until June 9th, 
when, at Ripley, Miss., a small town about twenty 
miles northwest of Guntown, General Grierson, who 
was in advance, reported that a few prisoners had 
been taken, and that in his judgment the main body 
of the enemy would be found the next day at or near 
the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. General Grierson, I 
am informed, advised General Sturgis to keep his men 
well in hand, as the enemy was " near and in force." 

The morning of the loth dawned clear and bright. 
Sturgis moved out early, the road leading through a 
dense forest of timber, shutting out from the column 
any possibility of air. The men who marched that day 
will never forget how hot it was in that woods. The 
very sand under their feet was as if they were treading 
in hot ashes. The perspiration poured off like rain. 

About twelve o'clock a courier from Grierson arrived 
at headquarters with despatches to the effect that he 
had encountered the enemy's pickets and scouts soon 
after leaving camp, but thus far had sustained no loss. 



GEXERAL STURGIS'S RAID. 



25 



nor had he found any trouble in pushing his way for- 
ward. General Sturgis sent word back to Grierson 
(I write what was reported by one of Sturgis's aides) 
to push forward as rapidly as possible, saying that 
he would hurry up the infantry to his support. 

The infantry had marched perhaps two miles when 
a staff-officer from the front arrived and said it was evi- 
dent that Forrest had been found at last ; that his force 
was not composed of roving bands, but of well-organ- 
ized troops ; that General Grierson did not deem it 
prudent to push forward any farther until he should 
learn more definitely what there was in his front. He 
believed, however, that Forrest's main force had been 
encountered, and certainly his (Grierson's) cavalry 
force, not exceeding fifteen hundred, could not cope 
with it, especially in that irregular country, with woods 
and swamps abounding on every side. 

Since my residence in Colorado I made the acquaint- 
ance of a gentleman from Northern Mississippi who 
informed me that upon his parents' plantation Gen- 
eral Sturgis passed the night previous to the battle, 
making his headquarters in his father's house. He 
assured me that Sturgis during his stay imbibed very 
freely of alcoholics and was stupidly drunk therefrom. 
This, in a measure, would account for his senseless 
order upon receiving the despatch from General 
Grierson. Upon receiving the report of Grierson's 
staff-officer, without heedino- the sugforestions it con- 



26 CAHABA. 

tained, Sturgis renewed his orders to Grierson to push 
forward, but soon afterward was aroused by a messen- 
ger from General Grierson, who brought substantially 
the following : 

" I have not the force at my command to advance 
farther. It is evident that I have met the bulk of For- 
rest's forces, but I hold a good position, which I think 
I can hold until you come up with the infantry." 

The message did not imply that Sturgis should use 
more than ordinary expedition, but upon receiving it 
the drunken, frenzied commander ordered his infantry 
to go upon the " double-quick " to the front, a distance 
of not less than five miles ! It should be remembered 
that the weather was intensely hot, sultry, oppressive ; 
that the road led through a heavy growth of timber ; 
that the men were marching with heavy loads — musket, 
cartridge-box, forty rounds of ammunition, canteen, 
haversack, and knapsack — but they were men who had 
been seasoned by many a hard campaign, and had 
never received an order but to obey it. 

The infantry and artillery had gone but a part of the 
way when another courier from General Grierson 
reached Sturgis bearing the information that the Con- 
federates were receiving re-enforcements from the South 
by rail. They came from Mobile, and had been sent 
to the aid of Forrest when it was known that Sturgis 
was seeking him. The whistling of the locomotives 
could be plainly heard by Grierson. With this infor- 



GENERAL GRIEK SON'S PLAN. 27 

mation, confirmed by prisoners captured, he suggested 
that Sturgis halt his command about three miles back, 
where it then was, form his infantry on a ridge, covered 
with high sedge grass, which would command nearly a 
mile of corduroy road, over which any troops would be 
compelled to pass should they follow him. Grierson 
would gradually fall back, and on nearing the point 
would stampede his cavalry, as if routed. He believed 
that Forrest would be drawn into such a trap. The 
entire infantry command would have been kept com- 
pletely out of sight, while the artillery could be halted 
just over the brow of the hill until the proper moment. 
Had Forrest followed Grierson, as he probably would 
under the circumstances, his forces would have been 
swept from the face of the earth, for they could not 
have turned back, and to have gotten off the corduroy 
would have been to sink in the mire beyond hope of 
succor. 

But General Sturgis was not in a frame of mind to 
listen to suggestions from a subordinate officer, much 
less a volunteer, and so "West Point" and whiskey 
asserted themselves. The men in the rear pressed for- 
ward with all possible haste by the order of their 
superior officer. For a mile or so they maintained a 
respectable organization. Then, panting for breath, 
dizzy with heat, wilted by the sultry air, they staggered 
along with broken ranks and in confusion. Some, 
determined to keep up with the mounted officers, 



28 CAHABA. 

threw away their knapsacks and outer clothing. Many 
were sunstruck, and falling by the wayside, or led to a 
place of shade by their more hardy companions, were 
left half or wholly unconscious of the multitude fleeing 
past them. Hardly a tithe of the thousands that began 
the wild, senseless race, ordered by their commander 
an hour before, reached the goal for which they started. 

An order, if possible more senseless than any other, 
compelled the large train of more than two hundred 
wagons to be taken over the long corduroy road and 
a narrow bridge, over which but one wagon at a time 
could pass, close up to the front ; and there, in plain sight 
of the Confederates, and in easy range of their artillery, 
the train was parked ! Should Sturgis be forced to 
retreat, it would be simply impossible to get his wagons 
back over this narrow bridge, and at no other place 
could they cross. It would have been impossible for 
them to cross the bottom over the deep morass. The 
only road was the corduroy leading to the bridge. No 
sane person could excuse any officer who would push 
his train forward so rapidly, and near where an uncer- 
tain battle was in progress, over a road which precluded 
even a possibility of saving it in case he was defeated. 

The leading regiment, the One Hundred and Four- 
teenth Illinois, reached the front almost breathless 
after its five-mile race, and was thrown at once into 
action without a solitary support, except the handful 
of Grierson's cavalry, already on the ground. These 



A HOT ENGAGEMENT. 



29 



men had been hotly engaged for four hours, and their 
ammunition was about exhausted. The Ninety-third 
Indiana arrived on the scene some ten minutes later, 
having been delayed by the stragglers of the One Hun- 
dred and Fourteenth Illinois. Lest I should be mis- 
understood, let me say that these stragglers were fall- 
ing behind, not on account of cowardice, but because 
overcome by heat and fatigue. Even in this breathless 
condition they were pressing on and doing the best 
they could to get to the front. A more gallant regi- 
ment was never enlisted. The Ninety-third Indiana 
reached the front with only a handful of men, breath- 
less and exhausted. It was formed on the right of 

* 
the One Hundred and Fourteenth Illinois, directly at 

the intersection of " Brice's Cross-Roads," the name 
given to this battle by the Confederates. Without a 
moment's halt to catch their wind, and with not a 
single regiment to support them, they moved forward 
in line of battle; but before their skirmishers could go 
fifty feet the rebels rose in the bushes in line of battle 
and poured into them a murderous volley, almost an- 
nihilating them, and before one half of them had fired 
a shot. They immediately opened fire, and were soon 
hotly engaged, but in a very few minutes their loss was 
so severe as to compel them to fall back for some sup- 
port. A few rods to their rear they met the Seventy- 
second Ohio, which, like the two preceding regiments, 
was sent into battle against the entire Confederate 



30 



CAHABA. 



force, with no regular support. Soon it too was forced, 
by the overwhelming numbers of the enemy, to fall 
back to a line with the battery of its brigade — Water- 
house's battery — which had just arrived and gone into 
action. 

Then followed the Ninety-fifth Ohio and Tenth 
Minnesota, of the same brigade. One at a time they 
were brought to the front and whipped in detail. 
Regiments numbering four and five hundred in the 
morninsf were reduced to mere battalions of one 
hundred and fifty. Fully half the command had 
for the time ceased to be available. They had been 
cruelly and uselessly sacrificed by the commanding 
p^eneral, and that too at a time wdien common-sense 
alone should have dictated the husbanding of his 
strength. His command was large enough to have 
gone anywhere in that section had it been properly led. 
Most of his troops were veterans, and in his wagons 
were ten days' rations, which would have enabled him 
to hold a picnic for that length of time in a section of 
country which was contributing of its substance in 
horses and men to the Confederacy. During the after- 
noon General Bouton's brigade of colored troops be- 
came hotly engaged and fought with coolness and 
desperation. General Bouton was twice captured 
during that day and as often retaken by his men. 
About four o'clock General Forrest had received 
sufficient re-enforcements to assume a vigorous offen- 



THE RETREAT. 3 I 

sive. Then the honors which followed really be- 
gan, as our troops were forced back to escape being 
surrounded. The large wagon train had so blocked 
the roads that not more than six of the twenty 
pieces of artillery were ever gotten into position. 
The teamsters became panic-stricken, cut loose their 
horses, and started pell-mell for the rear, which, it, 
must be admitted, they were fully justified in doing. 
The retreat began about five o'clock, and before 
an hour had passed it became a rout. Old veterans 
who had fought at Vicksburg, Shiloh, and Jackson 
now realized that their commanding officer was un- 
worthy their confidence, and sought their own safety 
in flight. To obey the orders of the commanding 
general was but to insure their own destruction, and 
suicidal as they knew it to be, they were compelled 
each to depend upon himself. 

The result was most disastrous. The whole national 
force was speedily routed. The demoralized troops 
fled back in wild confusion over the narrow and diffi- 
cult road, without supplies and with no re-enforcements 
near. Some of the troops crowded back on the road 
over which they came through the whole of the night. 
The dead were left where they fell. The wounded, 
aided (if possible) by friends, staggered painfully along, 
enabled in rare cases, by 'the help of their more fortu- 
nate companions, to secure transportation in the few 
ambulances and wagons saved for the time from cap- 



32 CAHABA. 

ture by the Confederates. The majority of the wounded, 
unable to obtain transportation, after marching a few 
miles or rods, weak and sick and faint, lay down beside 
the road, and in despair watched the army, wrecked by 
an incompetent leader, as it straggled past; and in a 
few minutes after the last men in blue passed by they 
were captives of the enemy. 

But few of those placed in the wagons fared any 
better. A shell from the batteries of the enemy, by 
breaking a wheel or disabling a part of the team, com- 
pelled their abandonment, or a volley from the Con- 
federates in dangerous proximity would impel the 
driver to cut loose his team, and mounting one, go 
racing to the front of the fugitive column. General 
Sturgis, completely unnerved by the wreck which his 
besotted brain had wrought, was willing, and proposed 
to surrender his whole command. " You can surren- 
der all others, but my men shall be taken back to 
Memphis!" was his answer from Grierson. 

While the Sturgis expedition was being prepared 
the regiment of which the author was a member re- 
turned from its "veteran furlough;" for it not enough 
horses could be at once obtained to mount the whole 
regiment, so only a portion participated in the expedi- 
tion. With our regiment as a body and with our offi- 
cers General Grierson was iutimately acquainted, and 
on the retreat from Guntown he demanded of them 
such hard and dangerous service as his many months 



A DEMORALIZED ARMY. 33 

as their brigade commander warranted him to expect 
would be faithfully performed. When the retreat was 
ended a roll of the regiment showed nearly one quarter 
of their number to have been killed and wounded. 

The second cavalry brigade, under Colonel Winslow, 
a small brigade, reduced in numbers by the absence of 
many of their comrades at home on veteran furlough, 
was also placed behind the demoralized army as a 
rear-guard during most of the retreat. The pursuit, 
characterized by all the vigor for which General Forrest 
was famous, was close and galling until the fugitives 
crossed a stream at Ripley. Here they turned on their 
pursuers and gave battle. Their spirited and unlooked- 
for resistance lessened the aggressiveness of the Con- 
federates and made their advance more cautious. For 
their own regimental and brigade officers the defeated 
Federals manifested their usual respect, but the appear- 
ance of General Sturgis all along the retreating column 
was greeted with groans and hisses and sheep-like 
bleatings, manifestations of their contempt and utter 
loss of respect for him. 
3 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE EXPERIENCE OF A WOUNDED MAN ON THE RE- 
TREAT FROM GUNTOWN RECAPTURED SENT TO 

MOBILE AND CAHABA. 

BY Ira F. Collins, then a private in the One Hun- 
dred and Fourteenth Illinois, since then an hon- 
ored and influential citizen of Kansas — a State Senator 
— who was severely wounded in the head and face, I 
have been given the experience of a wounded man on 
the retreat to Memphis. Without such a picture the 
story of the " Guntown Disaster " would be incomplete. 
Almost immediately after Collins's regiment began fall- 
ing back from the position held by it during the battle, 
he was wounded by a bullet, which, striking him just 
back of the right ear, passed through the ear close to 
the skull, into the cheek-bone, and out at the corner 
of the right eye. The effect of the blow was to knock 
him reeling to the earth. Rising, however, in a few 
moments, he resumed the retreat, but in a short time 
fell fainting to the ground. Two German boys — 
brothers — members of Collins's company, ran to him, 
and each carrying one of his arms over their shoulders, 
assisted him back to the creek near by, into which all 



A WOUNDED MAN'S EXPERIENCE. 35 

plunged and waded through. The cool water lessened 
the flow of blood from the wound, and drinking to 
repletion, he was much revived. His two comrades 
hastened back with him as fast as possible, and sought 
some means of conveyance for him. Not an ambu- 
lance could be found, so his comrades loaded him into 
the back end of an ammunition wagon drawn by six 
mules and driven by a good-natured darkey. Then 
one returned to his place in the ranks, and the other 
remained to assist the wounded man. Before the 
wagon had gone half a mile the road became entirely 
blockaded by other wagons, ambulances, caissons, gun- 
carriages, and straggling mounted men. To make 
matters worse, rebel shells began dropping into the 
tangled mass, and in a few moments killed one of the 
mules drawing the ammunition wagon. Convinced 
that he could not proceed farther with his charge, the 
driver detached his saddle-mule from the wagon, and 
mounting it, at the request of Collins's friend took 
the wounded man on the back of the animal behind 
him, while the German walked beside him to keep 
Collins from falling off. 

The Confederates were close upon them, and their 
bullets " pinged " about the trio as they started to over- 
take the ambulance train. Hastening forward, they 
soon overtook an ambulance not completely filled, and 
in this, faint and weak, the Illinois boy was placed. 
The further description of their miserable retreat is 



36 CAHABA. 

best told by the wounded man himself in his own 
language : 

"The ambulance into which I was admitted con- 
tained three other wounded men. One was shot in the 
leg, one in the arm, and the other through the body. 
This one and I occupied the rear end of the ambulance 
and the other two the front. The size of an ambulance 
box is about three by eight feet, and four wounded men 
to occupy this space without annoying each other re- 
quired a great deal of patience and care. But I was soon 
oblivious to all around me. That awful faintness over- 
powered me, and I unconsciously went to sleep. The 
sun had not yet gone down when I was placed in the 
ambulance, and it was past midnight when I awoke. 
The moon was just coming up in the east, and the 
night was as clear and quiet as one ever saw. When 
I awoke I found that my companion beside me had 
fallen into the last long sleep of death, and his eyes 
were set and glaring, as if to watch his spirit in its 
flight to heaven. My friend that was shot in the arm 
had disappeared, and the one that was shot in the leg 
was begging for a drink of water, in which I soon 
joined him, and it was not long before our appeal was 
answered by a straggler passing by. My wounded 
comrade, in answer to my inquiry as to the situation, 
informed me that we were at the edge of a great swamp, 
that the road was blockaded with ambulances and 
wagons mired down, that our driver had cut his team 




HON. IRA F. COLLINS. 

(formerly II4TH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.) 



A FRIEND IN NEED. 2>7 

loose, and mounting one of the horses and our com- 
rade who was shot in the arm another, they had 'lit 
out,' leaving us to the mercy of a few stragglers. The 
situation was everything but pleasant to contemplate, 
and it looked as if we were booked for a tour through 
the Confederacy ; but I determined to make a desper- 
ate effort to yet save myself. By an effort I raised 
myself to a sitting position to watch for an oppor- 
tunity for assistance. The rising moon gave the strag- 
gling soldiers a better opportunity to get away, many 
of whom had laid by and caught a little rest in the 
dark part of the night. As soon as the moon came 
up they came out of their hiding-places and came 
hurrying by, singly and in squads, heedless of the 
groans of the wounded and dying. Some of them 
were mounted on mules, some were on horses, but the 
most of them were plodding along on foot. I soon 
heard the voice of a man I knew belonged to our 
regiment. He had come to the regiment with some 
other recruits from Springfield, III, and was as- 
signed to Company B. He was a great, big, overgrown 
countryman, with a mouth on him capable of furnish- 
ing chin-music for two or three companies, but with a 
heart in him as big as a mountain. He was known in 
the regiment as ' Big Archie.' As he approached, I 
saw that he was mounted on a government mule. This 
chance was not to be lost, so I called to him by name. 
He turned, rode close up to the ambulance, and looked 



^S CAHABA. 

me over critically, but did not recognize me. I do not 
think that my most intimate friends would have done so 
at that time. He said, ' Who be you } ' I replied, ' One 
of the One Hundred and Fourteenth.' 'Wounded?' 
Yes.' ' Bad }' ' Yes ; got a mighty sore head.' ' Who's 
with you ? ' ' No one but this corpse here beside me and 
the fellow over there in the front end, wounded in 
the leg.' ' Where is the surgeon that belongs to this 
ambulance.?' 'He is gone, the hospital steward's 
gone, the driver's gone, and I want you to load me on 
that mule and take me along.' ' All right. I'll never 
leave any one of my regiment so long as I can be of 
any service to him ; so just climb on behind me and 
let's be off, as the Johnnies are liable to come along at 
any time.' He rode up as close as he could and 
helped me on, and after bidding my late companion 
with the wounded leg good-by, we left him alone with 
his cold and silent companion. I felt cheered and 
buoyed up at the prospect of making my escape, but at 
the same time I felt sad at leaving my comrade with 
his shattered leg, lying there all alone, with no one to 
keep him company, soothe his pain, or give him so much 
as a drink of water. It is said that the fever that fol- 
lows a gun-shot wound fills the mind with the wildest 
fancies. What frightful pictures, then, must have passed 
before his mind that night as he lay there with no 
companion save the pale moon, the silent stars, and 
the lifeless form of his dead comrade ! 



''BIG ARCHIE." 39 

" After I was mounted on the mule behind ' Big 
Archie' I put my arms around him and locked my 
hands in front of him and for a time held on quite 
well. But it was not very long before I began to 
grow weak and tired and sick, and a terrible faintness 
came over me, and I longed to lie down anywhere, so 
that I might get a little rest. I asked 'Archie' if there 
was any prospect of our army making a stand or going 
into camp. He said, ' Yes ; they gave us h — 1 yes- 
terday ; it will be our turn to-day, and we will pay 
them back with a big per cent on their investment' 
But all his encouraging talk failed to furnish stimulant 
enough to keep up my drooping spirits, and I was 
prevented from falling off only by his strong hold on 
my wrists in front of him. I begged him to put me 
off in a fence corner, or anywhere else. He finally 
promised that he would leave me at the first house we 
came to, and I did not have long to wait, though it 
seemed an age to me. He rode up to a double log- 
cabin — two rooms standing apart, with a porch be- 
tween. The floor of the porch was about two or three 
feet from the ground, and on that my good friend tried 
to land me, but failed, and I fell to the ground. He 
threw me his blanket, and I had just got settled down 
to rest when an old woman came out and asked who 
was there. I answered : ' A wounded Yank.' She 
asked if there was anything she could do for me. I 
said I would like to be taken into the house, as I was 



40 CAHABA. 

chilled with the night air and the dew and awfully 
sick besides. In fact, I thought my time had come. 
The old lady and her daughter-in-law came out and 
assisted me into the house and into bed. The old lady 
saw that I needed a stimulant, and that at once, so 
she set about immediately making me a cup of 
coffee. 

" There was a large, old-fashioned fireplace in one end 
of the room, with a bed of live coals in it, and beside 
the fire sat a tea-kettle full of hot water ; so the time 
was short until the coffee was made, of which I could 
drink only two or three swallows ; but this small 
amount seemed to revolutionize my whole system, to 
put new life into my body, and I soon dropped asleep. 
I had slept about an hour when I was awakened by a 
loud knocking at the door, with the demand to be ad- 
mitted. The old lady took down the barricade from 
the door, when in stepped a lieutenant of the Con- 
federate army, and inquired how long it had been since 
the last ' Yanks ' had passed. The old lady said she 
thought they were still passing. He then informed 
her that he was one of General Forrest's staff and that 
the general was at the door. This was anything but 
pleasant news to me, as till then I had hopes of mak- 
ing my escape ; but I now realized that I was a prisoner 
of war, badly wounded, and in the hands of the Con- 
federates. 

" Soon after the young staff-officer left, the old lady 



ROBBED BY TWO TEXAN RANGERS. 4 1 

Stepped to the door and blew a conch-shell, which 
brought her husband from his hiding-place in the brush. 
He was an old man, about seventy years of age, and in 
mortal dread of being picked up by the * Yanks ' and 
shipped off to a Northern prison. Along about seven 
or eight o'clock in the morning a couple of Texan 
Rangfers strode in and called for breakfast. The old 
lady and her daughter-in-law went into the other part 
of the house to prepare their breakfast. The old man 
was also out of the room. As soon as the room was 
left to the Texans and myself, they proceeded to take 
an inventory of the wounded ' Yank ' and his effects. 
The first thing to attract their attention was my gum 
blanket, which had been spread to keep my bloody 
clothing from soihng the bedding. They rolled me 
over and pulled the blanket out, with the cheering re- 
mark that I would not need it any more. They then 
pulled a plain gold ring off my finger, went through 
my pants pockets, and took an old wallet with about 
two dollars and fifty cents in it. This was my first in- 
itiation into the Confederacy. My two Confederate 
friends concluded not to wait for the breakfast they 
had ordered, but took a hast}'- departure. When the 
old lady came in to call them to breakfast she found 
they had gone and that 1 had been robbed by two of 
the chivalrous defenders of the South. It was an 
eye-opener for her, as she had always imagined that 
Southern soldiers were the embodiment of perfection 



42 CAIIABA. 

and honor. Such an act on the part of the Northern 
soldiers would not have surprised her in the least, as 
she believed that the Northern army was largely com- 
posed of the worst class of humanity, who were ac- 
tuated in their invasion of the South by the prospect 
of pillage and plunder, and she could only excuse this 
robbery on the ground that they were not Mississip- 
pians but Texans, who were more devoid of honor 
than the rest of the Confederate soldiers. 

." After this two other rebel soldiers came along with 
a prisoner. He was a German, and could not speak 
English. They stopped and got a drink of water. 
The prisoner made signs that he wanted something 
to eat, but his captors would not listen to him, seem- 
ing to be in a great hurry. They prodded him along 
with their bayonets, because he did not move quick 
enough. They went out swearing that they would 
just as leave kill the d — d Dutchman as not, who 
had been hired to come out here and fight against 
' weuns.' The house stood back three or four rods 
from the road, and it was only a few moments until I 
heard the report of a gun. The old man looked out, 
and said they had killed the Dutchman. They had 
probably ordered him to do something which he did 
not understand, and his not obeying the order gave 
them an excuse to kill him in cold blood, to gratify a 
malice that existed throughout the South because the 
Germans were loyal to the land and government of 



AN OLD WOMAN'S INQUISITIVENESS. 43 

their adoption. Wherever I went I found that the 
rebels were exceedingly bitter against them, and I 
have no doubt but the feeling was general. The 
guards in charge of this poor, unfortunate German did 
not stop to make arrangements for the funeral, but 
hurried on, leaving him lying in the road. The old 
man of the house where I was stopping got another 
old man, one of his neighbors, that afternoon, and 
buried the German in a fence corner near where he 
was murdered ; for murder it was, and in the ' first 
degree ' at that. 

" After the excitement of the morning had worn off 
somewhat, the old lady set about to cleanse and dress 
my wound as best she could with the scanty means at 
her command. She had neither soap, lint, nor band- 
ages — all very necessary articles to properly handle 
my case with. Yet when she was through I felt very 
much refreshed. While at work she was very inquis- 
itive, and wanted to know why I had come down 
there to fight 'weuns' when they had not tried to 
molest the people of the North. She said that all 
they wanted was to be left alone ; that they were not 
trying to deprive the North of any of its rights or 
property, and that she could not understand why we 
wanted to take their property from them. She in- 
sisted that the North was responsible for every drop 
of blood that was being spilled ; that we never could 
whip them, for they were fighting to defend their 



44 CAHABA. 

homes and property, and in such a cause were bound 
to succeed, and the sooner ' old Lincoln ' understood 
this the sooner the war would end in the indepen- 
dence of the South. 

" I was not in a very good condition to argue with 
her, and only remarked that there could be one result 
of the war, and that would be the maintenance of the 
Union. After she was through discussing the war, she 
said I would soon be paroled and sent home, while 
all that was able-bodied would be held in Southern 
prisons, and as soon as I got home she wished I 
would interest myself in getting her son paroled, who 
was then a prisoner at Camp Douglas, Chicago, 111. 
I informed her that I was an Illinois soldier, and 
did not live far from Chicago ; that if only a private, 
I had great influence with Governor Yates, who lived 
only a few miles from my home, and I would surely 
send her son home to her as soon as I got home my- 
self It turned out that the old lady had three sons in 
the Confederate service, and that the prisoner was 
her youngest, and was the husband of the young lady. 
From this time on I was the object of special in- 
terest to the women of the house, and received every 
attention they could bestow. Chickens were scarce 
in that neighborhood since the two armies had passed 
through ; nevertheless, the old family rooster was killed 
to make broth for the wounded ' Yank,' in order that 
he might the sooner recover and be permitted to re- 



WOUNDED PRISONERS. 45 

turn to the North, where he could carry out his mis- 
sion of love and charity. 

" The place where I was stopping was fourteen miles 
from Guntown and five miles from the swamp where 
we had mired down and been abandoned. I re- 
mained here until the second day after the battle, 
when a rebel surgeon came in and examined my 
wound. By this time it was greatly swollen, and one 
could easily lay his hand in the opening. The surgeon 
proceeded to sew it up, which operation was a good 
deal like trying to draw the mouth of a well-filled sack 
together, and caused me the greatest pain and agony. 
But the irritation caused by drawing the two raw 
edges of the wound together soon increased the 
swelling, tearing out the stitches and affording me 
great relief. In the afternoon a train of three or four 
ox-teams stopped in front of the house, and I was 
loaded into one of the wagons, all of which were 
loaded with wounded prisoners that had been picked 
up along the road. The teams were all driven by old 
and superannuated men like the one where I was 
stopping, and who had been pressed into the service 
to assist in gathering up the wounded ' Yanks.' 
There were a few rebel soldiers as guards to the teams, 
and we moved along at a very slow pace. At almost 
every house we came to a halt was made and more 
wounded added to our number. The heat was intense. 
The sun poured down its burning rays upon our un- 



46 CAHABA. 

protected bodies like a ball of liquid fire, while the 
green flies swarmed around our festering wounds like 
bees around a hive. I had mine tied up as best I 
could, to protect it from their fatal blow, but not 
secure enough. We went into camp that night close 
to a great swamp without anything to eat and noth- 
ing for beds except the hard, bare ground. The 
recollections of that summer night will remain fresh 
in memory as long as life shall last. My companions 
were wounded in every conceivable shape. They had 
gone from two to three days without attention, and 
the long, jostling ride in the ox-wagons, exposed to the 
heat of the sun, aggravated by the deadly work of the 
green flies, caused them the utmost distress, and their 
delirious ravings were most heart-rending and pitiful. 
With regard to my own wound, the track of the ball 
was directly across the cavity of the ear, into which 
the blood had run, and which had become hard and 
dry, creating an inflammation and causing an earache 
a hundred times more painful than the wound itself. 
To add still further to my distress, the green flies had 
left their tormentors, and they had worked their way 
into my ear, and there was no way of getting them 
out ; so I was forced not only to endure the pain, but 
was tortured by the thought that I would be eaten 
up alive by maggots. At last the night wore away, 
and we made an early start on our journey back across 
the battle-field, past long rows of new-made graves. 



ARRIVAL AT GUN TOWN. 



47 



All around we could see evidences of the terrible work 
of the battle. Stumps of great trees, some twenty 
feet high, with their tops cut off and their bodies torn 
and splintered, were standing as the only monuments 
over these graves. Great flocks of buzzards were 
sailing around over the battle-field, while hundreds of 
others on trees and stumps were contentedly resting 
from their gorgeous feast of putrid flesh and watching 
with seeming satisfaction the ripening of their loath- 
some harvest. 

'' We arrived at Guntown about four p.m. Here 
the rebel surgeons had established their hospitals, and 
as the wounded ' Yanks ' were brought in they were 
trimmed up in the most approved style. An old car- 
penter's bench stood under a tree, and was used as a 
dissecting-table, and as we drove up we saw at one 
end of this bench two or three dozen arms and legs, 
and several more were added from our party ; and from 
the way they were cutting and sawing, I didn't know 
but they might conclude to amputate my head. We 
were unloaded and placed in a tent on some straw. I 
soon got the attention of a hospital steward, and told 
him the condition of my wound. He got some tur- 
pentine and injected it into my ear and over my 
wound, which had the desired effect of cleaning out 
the maggots. After getting my wound attended to 
we were served with supper by a delegation of ladies 
who had been feeding the Confederate wounded, and 



48 CAHABA. 

had enough left for our squad. The supper consisted 
of stewed chicken and warm biscuit, and was the best 
meal I ate while I was in the Confederacy. It had 
been a long time between meals with us, as we had 
not eaten anything since noon the day before, and 
this supper of wholesome food, so well cooked and 
delicately served, was relished, at least by me, as none 
had been before, or was afterward, while I was in 
the service. 

" We stayed in Guntown till evening of the next day, 
when we were loaded into box cars bedded with straw 
and started on our way to Mobile, Ala. The train 
consisted of ten cars, six of which were loaded with 
wounded, three with Government wagons captured at 
the battle of Guntown, and one with the guards. 
Those loaded with wagons were flat cars, and were next 
the engine. The cars were all old and greatly out of 
repair. They had apparently been in use since the be- 
ginning of the war, without ever being near a repair- 
shop for repairs. And if the cars were in bad order 
and in need of repair, the road-bed was worse. Bridges 
were rotten, the iron was badly w^orn and bent from 
long use, the ties rotten and gone in many places, so 
that the rails were without support, fills were washed 
out, and cuts had been filled up by heavy rains. Sec- 
tion-men were a thing of the past, the Confederate 
army having absorbed all the able-bodied men. 

"We started from Guntown just before sundown, and 



A TERRIBLE DISASTER OJV THE ROAD. 49 

went bumping along over the road at the rate of six 
or eight miles an hour. About midnight we were 
startled by the car I was in leaving the rails and jump- 
ing along on the ties. In a moment the car turned over 
and down an embankment some six or eight feet high, 
throwing us with considerable force from the floor to 
the roof, on which it rested. For a moment after the 
car had struck the ground all was still — still as death ; 
then a groan, a wail, and cries for help rang out through 
the darkness of the night, which told of the agony of 
those who, with a freshly-amputated arm or leg, or with 
limbs or bodies crushed with ball or bruised with shell, 
had been hurled from the floor to the roof, only to 
strike upon bleeding stumps or bandaged wounds. 
Some cried for help, some for a light to bandage up 
their gaping wounds, some cursed the luck that seemed 
to fate them for all the miseries that could be meted 
out lo man ; others prayed and begged for some one 
to put them out of their misery ; others still could only 
moan out broken sentences in their unconsciousness. 
Help was slow in coming, as the guards had their own 
killed and crippled to attend to first. Many of the 
guards were riding on the top of the cars to see that 
no one escaped, and when the cars turned over they 
were badly bruised and smashed, but only one was 
killed outright. At last the door was forced open, and 
the guards got to work carrying out the wounded. 
They laid us on a bank beside the track. We had 
4 



50 CAHABA. 

with us a rebel surgeon, one or two assistant surgeons, 
and a few able-bodied men to wait on the wounded. 
These and the guards did all they could for the 
wounded, but when the car was opened some were al- 
ready past all help, while others soon bled to death from 
having their wounds torn open. Had the car been 
filled with able-bodied men the damage and injury had 
been slight, but as it was not one escaped unhurt. In 
the course of time the wreck was cleared away, we 
were again loaded in other cars and started on our 
funeral-like journey. At Guntown I found the first 
lieutenant of my company, who had been wounded in 
the fleshy part of the thigh near the groin — a very dan- 
gerous and painful wound. He had a faithful nurse 
with him in the person of Sergeant Henry Freeman 
of the same company. Freeman divided his attention 
among all in our car in the way of getting water, loosen- 
ing bandages, and bathing feverish and painful wounds. 
The place of the wreck was in a big forest, and after 
all had been gotten out and attended to, it occurred to 
the sergeant to make his escape, and he so informed 
the lieutenant and myself He said he would like to 
go, but would not leave us if we said stay. We told 
him that if he had a chance to save himself to do so, 
as I would soon be able to wait upon the lieutenant. 
So we whispered to him a few words or messages to be 
sent to dear ones waiting for news from us at home. 
A pressure of the hand, a word of encouragement, a few 



SERGEANT FREEMAN'S ESCAPE. 5 I 

moments' waiting, and the opportunity had come. Like 
a frightened deer, he bounded into the dark shades of 
the forest and disappeared. How the lieutenant and 
I wished we were on our feet and with him ! We sup- 
posed that within a week he would be within our lines, 
striking the Mississippi River at some point between 
Vicksburg and Natchez ; but, poor fellow, he had a 
hard road before him, wading through cypress swamps 
and canebrakes, living on roots and berries, and hiding 
in swamps by day and travelling by night, with no 
definite idea as to whether he was keeping the right 
course or not. At any rate, for thirty days he wandered 
through swamps and woods all alone, with no com- 
panions but the owls and whippoorwills, until he be- 
came a walking skeleton, bereft of reason. On July 
9th the army was marching not far from Guntown 
battle-field,, being in the neighborhood of Tupelo, 
when the advance guard found a man standing by a 
tree in a most wretched condition. His clothes were 
nearly all torn from his body, his hands and face were 
covered with cuts and sores, and it was only by the 
greatest effort that he could walk at all. And strange 
to say, he had lost his speech, so that he could not 
talk so as to be understood. By some means his 
identity was discovered, and as all that was left of 
the One Hundred and Fourteenth was with A. J. 
Smith at that time, he was sent to our company. 
The captain of the company did not recognize his 



52 . CAHABA. 

own sergeant, nor did the sergeant recognize his 
captain. It took the best of nursing to bring him 
back to health. Indeed, he never did fully recover. 
At thirty he was an old and broken-down man, and a 
few years ago he sunk into an untimely grave. 

"Our further journey to Mobile after the wreck was 
without particular incident. We arrived at our des- 
tination about noon on Sunday, and were at once 
transferred from the cars to the old Garner House, 
which had been improvised as a hospital for our recep- 
tion. This house is situated on the principal street of 
the city, fronting the bay and the Mobile and Ohio 
depot. The location was a good one for observation. 
The lieutenant and myself with half a dozen others were 
assigned to a corner room on the second floor facing 
the north and east, giving us a good view of the main 
street, the bay, and the depot. We were soon washed 
and rigged out in calico shirts, so as to be presentable 
to the public, who were clamoring for admission to see 
the first crop of ' Yanks ' that had been gathered 
into their granary. They were admitted in squads, 
composed of men, women, and children, who marched 
through the different wards in charge of the ward mas- 
ter or his assistants, and inspected each wounded pris- 
oner with about the same curiosity that a crowd has 
for the animals in a circus tent ; and the ward master 
acted as guide and explained each case as they came 
to it. I recollect hearing him invite some lady friends 



SURGICAL EXPERIMENTS. 53 

to come into our ward and see a ' Yank ' with his head 
shot off. The exhibition only lasted two or three 
hours, when the public were turned out, and visitors 
were never admitted after that. 

"For a number of years before the war Mobile had 
been the seat of quite a flourishing medical college, 
and there were quite a number of students yet in at- 
tendance. The arrival of our party was a feast for 
them, and they at once began a series of experiments 
upon the worst cases among us. I recollect one poor 
fellow in our ward. His name was Starr; he was a ser- 
geant in an Ohio regiment — the Ninety-third, I think. 
He was shot in the shoulder and was badly mangled, 
yet he was able to be up and walk around most of the 
time, and as he was a bright and intelligent young fel- 
low he soon became a favorite in our ward. After two 
or three weeks the rebel surgeons decided that it would 
be necessary to operate upon his shoulder-blade. So 
they took him down into the office and proceeded to 
unjoint his arm at the shoulder and take out the entire 
shoulder-blade. That was the last of poor Starr, who 
had been the life of our ward. They brought him 
back and laid him on his cot in his old place, but the 
shock had been too much for him. He lingered along 
a few days, half unconscious of what was going on 
around him, and died." 

Collins remained at Mobile until August, when, 
being well enough to be discharged from the hospital, 



54 CAHABA. 

and that city being strongly threatened by the fleet of 
Farragut, he was sent to Castle Morgan, where in a 
later chapter we shall find him engaged in the struggles 
for liberty, secret or open, that made restless the lives 
of many who, like him, were unwilling inmates. 

Returning briefly to the army of General Sturgis, 
which a few pages back we left fleeing toward Mem- 
phis, we would state that of the thousands which had 
marched out ten days before, composed of the very 
best troops in the West, troops that had fought on a 
score of victorious fields, less than two thirds returned, 
and even these were stripped of almost everything save 
their small arms, and many had thrown these away as 
impediments to their flight and a useless encumbrance 
under such a leader as Sturgis. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE DEFEAT OF STURGIS A BITTER SURPRISE TO EVERY 

ONE A. J. SMITH SENT AGAINST FORREST — THE 

ENEMY MET AT PONTOTOC — CHARGE OF A PORTION 
OF THE NINTH ILLINOIS CAVALRY AGAINST THREE 
CONFEDERATE BRIGADES CAPTURE OF AUTHOR. 

THIS defeat was a surprise to the whole country, 
but it was not so astounding to the troops in 
West Tennessee as the fact that Sturgis was permitted 
to remain a general officer in the army. Some of the 
fugitives from the Sturgis disaster arrived in Memphis 
during the night of June 1 2th, having travelled day and 
night, and nearly all were there by the 14th. Immedi- 
ately most active preparations were made for fitting 
out another expedition for the purpose of wiping out 
the disgrace and accomplishing the object sought — i. e., 
to defeat General Forrest's forces. This expedition was 
placed under the command of General A.J. Smith, who 
had won a most enviable reputation as a bold, judi- 
cious, and most vigorous fighter. The disastrous failure 
of General Sturgis, following so closely upon the heels 
of the other unsatisfactory expeditions in the West, had 



56 CAHABA. 

produced alarm and bitter indignation. Smith, called 
by our men " Old ragged A. J.," though personally un- 
known to the men of Grierson, by reputation stood 
high in their estimation. In him every man had im- 
plicit confidence. A body of cavalry was sent to La 
Grange, Tenn., fifty miles west of Memphis, in less 
than a week after the return of Sturgis. All prepara- 
tions were complete by July 5th, and on that day the 
whole command of Smith was on the march toward 
Tupelo, near where it was known that the Confeder- 
ates were in force. Light skirmishing continued each 
day of the march until the nth, when the Union 
army arrived at Pontotoc, and the advance rested there 
through the day, while the main body of Smith's 
troops were preparing for the encounter that was 
known to be near at hand. In the afternoon a squad- 
ron of our regiment was placed on picket a mile or 
two southeast of Pontotoc, and remained there dur- 
ing the night. The Confederate forces were estimated 
to number about fourteen thousand, and the forces of 
Smith were about the same. 

During the night two or three mounted Confeder- 
ates, while feeling their way about the lines in our im- 
mediate vicinity, came close up to one of our videttes, 
and were halted. The vidette at that particular post 
was a new recruit, a young boy just down from tne 
North, who had never been in the presence of an 
enemy more formidable.than some young schoolfellow 



AN INTERCHANGE OF COURTESIES. 57 

who may have crossed his path by having an affection 
for his chosen inamorata. He had been instructed to 
halt any one coming toward him from any direction. 
Perhaps his instructions had gone no farther. Certain 
it is that his order to halt was followed by a shot from 
the Confederate, and another shot immediately after. 
Such an astounding reply to a civil request struck 
him dumb with astonishment, and then, as he consid- 
ered it, his sensitive soul, bruised and down-trodden, 
sought relief in tears, and seeing that the Confederate 
was rapidly approaching him, he ran to his nearest 
comrade, a few rods away, exclaiming, " Boo-hoo ! boo- 
hoo ! boo-hoo ! That — that damn fool has tried to shoot 
me just because I spoke to him !" His comrade, Dwight 
Talcott, to whom he had run, knew more of the eccen- 
tric ways of the Confederates, and extended the "com- 
pliments of the season," with " best wishes," from a re- 
peating rifle. The interchange of courtesies seemed 
mutually satisfactory, and further civilities were post- 
poned to a more convenient season. That boy was 
heartily laughed at for a few days, I was told, but in 
later engagements learned to extend and return com- 
pliments with the utmost self-control, and after win- 
ning the esteem of his comrades in several battles, lost 
his life near Nashville. 

During the afternoon of the nth a few of the 
horsemen of the enemy appeared on our front, and 
venturing too near, to make better observations, a 



58 CAHABA. 

white horse ridden by one of them was killed by a 
bullet from our men. Seven years after, in New York 
City, I met a young medical student who, in conversa- 
tion, described to me how he had had a white horse shot 
by our forces at that point. A slight comparison of notes 
established his identity, and in serio-comic words he de- 
manded and received at my expense an extra glass of 
soda-water as compensation in full for the loss he had 
sustained that July day. He was L. L. Crump, of 
West Point, Miss., a most companionable gentleman. 

Hardly had we cooked our coffee on the morning 
of the 1 2th when another portion of our regiment was 
sent out to our picket post, and the combined force, 
numbering about eighty men, was commanded to push 
back the pickets of the enemy until it was certain how 
much of a force was stationed on that road. 

Our commander that morning was Captain Buel — 
sturdy, self-sacrificing, given by his men an esteem 
that a father might envy; and the esteem was returned. 
It was possibly prejudicial to military discipline, but 
for three years he had messed with the boys, the sons 
of his old neighbors. For three years he had refused 
a promotion that would separate him from his Com- 
pany ".G." We laughed at some of his old-fashioned 
notions, but loved him all the more. 

Our company's commander was Captain Harper, 
later colonel of the regiment. While our relations were 
not of the most cordial character, I admired his un- 



A RECONNAISSANCE. 



59 



questioned bravery and dash. In camp we recognized 
him as almost a martinet, but in the shock of battle, 
in the hour of danger, where a cool head, a quick 
perception, a prompt, vigorous action may be neces- 
sary, no regiment of men could give to a command 
the feeling of strength, self-reliance, and security that 
the presence of Captain Harper did. His nobler quali- 
ties so completely hid his minor faults that memory 
has given him a warm corner in my heart. The com- 
mand is all ready, and moves out toward the picket 
post of the enemy, plainly in view. Before us for a 
half mile is an open pasture, embracing perhaps a 
quarter section of land. Through its centre runs an 
unfenced road upon which we are to move. On either 
side of the road, scattered here and there, are stumps 
of trees and little shrubs. Halfway between our com- 
mand and the pickets of the enemy runs a little brook. 
From our starting-point to the brook is a gentle de- 
cline. From the brook toward the farther side of the 
field, where a dozen or two of the Confederates are 
seen, the ground rises abruptly. Down to the brook 
we ride without opposition, but beyond that point 
our progress is disputed. The sharp reports of rifles 
ring out upon the air, and a few bullets spat the ground 
beside us. Then we dismount, and advance in line on 
foot. Our opponents present an irregular line, remain 
stationary for a few minutes, fire, and slowly retreat. 
Our force return their fire, run up the hill toward 



6o CAM ABA. 

them, and when their bullets whistle thick, we seek 
protection behind the stumps and shrubs for a few min- 
utes. The distance between our line and theirs grows 
less, until they enter a more shrubby place. Where 
they are the shrubs cover half the ground, and behind 
them but a short distance is a dense undergrowth so 
completely covered with leaves that it is impossible 
to see a distance of your own length through its fo- 
liage. 

The Confederates retreat into the dense thicket, and 
we lessen the distance between them and us. Though 
we are unable to see them now, we are conscious that 
their numbers have been increased. Down in the 
pasture their number was perhaps a score. We feel 
that they may now number one hundred, perhaps a 
double of that. Our own force does not exceed eighty 
men, but for two years we have been armed with the 
repeating rifle, and know its full value at close quarters. 
In previous engagements we have seen a company of 
our men armed with their swift repeating guns more 
than a match for a regiment of the enemy armed with 
muzzle-loading pieces only. Our success in the past has 
given to our men an overweening confidence ; a con- 
fidence that has won in the past, and in the future 
shall win for them, an enviable name; a confidence that 
in this case came near being their annihilation. Our 
leaders, too, are not men who are given to accepting 
"hearsay evidence" where they have been commanded 



HOT WORK AT HAND. 6 1 

to bring back positive information as to the position 
and strength of the enemy. 

For more than a year we have been commanded 
by Lieutenant-Colonel Berg, an alert, brave, judicious 
man, whose influence and training have made his regi- 
ment one of the most aggressive in the department. 
It is to officers that regiments owe much of their repu- 
tation. A regiment of heroes can win but a meagre 
reputation for bravery under the command of cow- 
ardly or inefficient officers. 

Only a few rods now separate our lines from that 
of the enemy, but an impenetrable veil of green leaves 
hides from our view not only their number, but every- 
thing distant more than an arm's length. We are con- 
scious, however, that they have been re-enforced, and 
halting for a moment, we make ready for the hot work 
that almost certainly is close at hand. Let us look be- 
yond the few rods that lie between these two eager com- 
batants. We shall observe an open field free from all 
stumps and trees rising gently for a half mile in our 
front, extending on either side a good rifle shot in 
distance. Close to the nearest edge of the field, in our 
immediate front, is a rail fence. It is but a few feet 
from — almost against — the thicket in which our men 
are now halted. Rails have been hastily brought from 
other parts of the field and piled against this fence, 
changing it into a breastwork. Behind this breast- 
work, immediately in front of our battalion, is placed 



62 CAHABA. 

Lyon's Kentucky brigade of Confederates. On their 
right extends Rucker's brigade, and back in the field, 
in good supporting distance, is placed McCullough's 
old brigade. Three veteran brigades, and against them 
less than one hundred men are about to rush ! What 
must be the result ? Can anything save them from 
total destruction ? If the leaves were away, two score 
of Confederates could aim at each of our men. The 
men of our command have halted long enough to re- 
place in their rifles all the cartridges that have been 
discharged. " Ready, men ! " rings out the clear voice 
of Captain Harper. " Forward ! Double quick !" and 
with a step as swift as the tangled bushes will permit, 
his men comply with the order. Hardly had I gone 
forward a dozen steps when an unseen trailing vine 
caught my toe and cast me headlong to the ground. 

So near were we to the enemy that every order was 
as clear to them as to us. They heard the order, " For- 
ward ! Double quick !" and waiting but a few moments, 
believing we must have been strongly re-enforced or 
we would not have the fortitude to charge them w^hen 
so stoutly posted behind a breastwork, and hearing 
the crackling of twigs in their immediate front, they 
were ordered to fire. The order was given just as I 
fell forward, and a thousand bullets flew hissing into 
the thicket. What an awful crash ! What a cutting 
of twigs and scarring of saplings just above me ! The 
smoke and powder seemed blown into our very 



ASSAULTING A DIVISION. 63 

faces. The thought came, perhaps'the fall was fortunate 
and had shielded me from something more serious ! 
And another thought — that I must have been excited. 
How could such a furious volley of musketry have 
come from a hundred guns ! The jar of the body must 
have strangely magnified the roar. Thoughts come 
quickly in moments of excitement ; but there was little 
time or inclination to reason upon the subject. In a 
moment I was up from the ground and running for- 
ward with all haste. One might pass within a yard of 
a comrade and be prevented by the leafy veil from see- 
ing or being seen by him. The idea that there were 
only our own number opposed to us was still upper- 
most in the mind. Two or three rods brought me to 
the edge of the underbrush, and two or three steps 
taken out into the open space placed me almost against 
the breastwork. Off" on my left in the thicket plainly 
are heard the yells of a comrade who has been crazed 
by a bullet that has burned his skull, Tom Raisor 
has a savage wound through his right arm, which a few 
weeks later gave him an empty sleeve. Twice before, 
in different engagements, has the brave fellow been 
wounded in that same right arm. Ed Branch, the new 
recruit, fresh and ruddy and strong, just from his 
Northern home, has been instantly killed by a bullet 
in his brain. Sergeant Abbott, who two years before 
used to carry me, crippled by a painful wound in the 
leg, could not carry a child now. His right arm is 



64 CAHABA. 

useless from a rag^ged bullet wound. Shortly after he 
was sent North to recuperate, and returned to his 
regiment only to be shot through the lung at Nash- 
ville. This wound, however, was not fatal. After a 
long struggle with disease his strong constitution con- 
quered, and a few years later he was administering the 
office of lieutenant-governor for the young State of Ne- 
braska. Ben Smith, of Company G, was dead. Henry 
Rinker and Charley Cheats are helpless from severe 
wounds in the leg. How many more have been dis- 
abled I know not. That furious hail of lead was spiteful 
enough to annihilate us in a few moments. None of 
our battalion have emerged from the dense thicket. 
Have they all been killed or disabled by that murder- 
ous fire.? I am alone, with a hundred guns aimed 
directly at me ! The front rank of the Confederates 
has fired its volley, and while hastily reloading there is 
a lull. For a moment I stop in confusion. A score 
of Confederates yell, " Don't shoot that man ; surren- 
der, d — n you, surrender !" And halting sideways to 
the breastwork, a tall, brawny Kentuckian reached out 
a long arm, and seizing the boyish Northern soldier 
by the collar of his shirt, or by the shoulder, jerked him 
from the Union into the Confederacy. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CONFEDERATES DECEIVED AS TO THE NUMBER OF 

THEIR ASSAILANTS TAKEN TO THE CONFEDERATE 

COMMANDER THE PROVOST GUARD. 

RUNNING so actively that hot day, for a few 
moments I was breathless and a passive subject 
in their hands while they stripped from me my arms, 
a dozen men swearing at me most roundly during the 
act. The instantaneous change from a pursuing, ex- 
ultant freeman to a roughly handled, roundly cursed, 
humble prisoner, presented a ludicrous side to my 
mind, and as soon as I could get breath suggested to 
my captors that the change was a rough joke to their 
unwilling guest. But they were in no joking mood. 
Indeed, they were never more serious in their lives. 
Seeing with what confidence we had approached them, 
they supposed that a large body of m.en must be imme- 
diately behind us, and so suggested to me. Casting 
my eyes to right and left, and aware then of the 
danger that menaced the remainder of our small 
force should the enemy know that our numbers 
were but few and that no support was nearer than 
5 



66 CAHABA. 

two or three miles, I sought to deceive them. 
" All is fair in love and war," and a truthful state- 
ment, if believed by them, could only bring disaster 
to my friends. I candidly informed a lieutenant-colonel, 
who was questioning me as to our strength, " Ours is 
only the. advance guard ; Smith's whole army is in our 
rear and close at hand. You will be charged soon — 
probably very soon — and by a force sufficient to carry 
your breastwork." He stopped in his questionings and 
shouted to his men, " Load up, every one of you ; the 
' Yanks ' will be on us in a few minutes ! Ready, every 
man !" Seeing that he was far more inclined to remain 
on the defensive than to attempt the capture of the 
squad in the thicket was most satisfactory to me, 
and to confirm him in my truthfulness I begged to 
be sent to the rear as soon as possible that I might not 
be wounded in the second charge alleged to be close 
at hand. 

Could he have known the real state of affairs, with 
a small part of his force he could easily have sur- 
rounded and captured the remnant of our small com- 
mand. I gave myself the credit that by a ruse de 
guerre, by coolness and apparent earnestness, they 
were saved from capture, and some perhaps from 
wounds or death. In accordance with custom I was 
sent to the rear, perhaps more quickly on account of 
my demand. A boyish Confederate of about my own 
age was called to guard me. He was commanded to 



SENT TO GENERAL BUFORD. 67 

take me first to the headquarters of General Buford, and 
when the general should have learned from me what 
could be of any value to him, to deliver me to the pro- 
vost guard. The three brigades mentioned constituted 
the division of Buford. The boy and I immediately 
started for the rear, at first with haste, but later with a 
slower walk, and had gone perhaps a quarter of a mile, 
and were away from all troops, when a freckled, red- 
headed, mean-looking fellow saw us from a distance, 
and coming toward us bawled out, "Hello! Yank; 
where did they pick you up ?" The reply to his ques- 
tion was not satisfactory, and at once he began a tirade 
of personal abuse. From the scowling looks of my 
young Kentucky guard I felt he had no sympathy with 
the cowardly language uttered by the speckled new- 
comer, and gathering assurance from his looks, I replied 
to the abusive words of the other with such language 
as I would not dared to have uttered had not I felt the 
guard a friend, and ready to protect me in my rights as 
a prisoner of war. The poltroon was unarmed, except 
with a small pistol, and was doubtless a hanger-on of 
the hospital department — a slop-emptier or some such 
character — and seemed to think that here was an op- 
portunity to injure an enemy with perfect safety to 
himself that he must not let pass. After pouring upon 
me a shower of mean epithets, he noticed that I had on 
a pair of spurs, and ordered me with an oath to "get 
down thar and take them ar spurs off, you dirty s !' 



68 CAHABA. 

We had stood there at first because the stranger had 
stopped us to ask questions, and had remained there be- 
cause the vials of his wrath were not yet empty. But I 
had noticed the face of the young Kentuckian growing 
blacker each moment, and when the demand was made 
of me to deliver up my spurs, he was no longer able to 
restrain his anger. I do not care to here repeat the 
contemptuous epithets he applied to the slop-emptier. 
Only such an occasion could excuse them. His rage 
increased with each moment. At length he cocked 
his rifle, and raising it half way to his shoulder, ex- 
claimed : "You d — d sneak, you speak another word 

to this fellow and I'll blow you to h in a minute ! 

He's a Yank, but he's got more man in his finger than 
is in your whole ornery body! Go 'long, now !" And 
the "ornery" fellow slunk away muttering something 
to himself apparently, certainly not distinctly under- 
stood by either of us. The young guard told me his 
own name was Beach; that his home was in Hender- 
son County, Ky., and that his mother still resided 
there. His manner and face were very prepossessing 
from the first, and after he proved himself so noble he 
seemed like a tried and true friend rather than my 
guard. The episode with the knight of the slop-bucket 
detained us only a few minutes, and passing farther to 
the rear, we soon came to a clear, bubbling spring of 
cold water, and as I was very thirsty, I asked the priv- 
ilege of stopping for a drink. Not only was the 



A FRIENDLY GUARD. 69 

privilege granted, but Beach himself knelt down on 
the opposite side of the stream, and we drank together 
like two comrades. Then he suggested that we sit 
there and rest for a while. This to me was most 
agreeable, and for a half hour we remained there, sitting 
in the shade of a tree near by, looking at the move- 
ments of some Confederate troops a quarter of a mile 
away, and compared notes as to our experiences during 
the past two years, and found that we had been together 
in several minor engagements. He mentioned that 
his mother still lived in Henderson County, Ky., 
and as that county is on the Ohio River, her residence 
was within the Union lines. In my pocketbook I had 
a dozen or two of United States postage stamps. 
These I took out and gave to him. United States 
stamps, I afterward learned, were quite valuable to 
Confederates having friends within Union lines, and 
were by them highly prized. He thanked me with 
much heartiness, and his manner was even more cor- 
dial than his words. He offered to pay me for the 
stamps, but he had been so generous toward me, and 
the intrinsic value of the stamps was so little, that his 
proposition could not be considered. I learned in a 
few weeks the value of even so little a thing as a three- 
cent stamp. They were worth, when we arrived at 
Cahaba, from twenty-five to fifty cents each in Confed- 
erate scrip. One of the spurs I had on at that time 
had had quite an interesting history. I had taken it 



JO CAHABA. 

from the boot of a dead Confederate at Moscow, Tenn., 
the winter previous, after the Confederate General S. 
D. Lee had attacked and had been repulsed at that 
place. This spur I gave to him, and one or two other 
things of little value. Two days after, at the battle of 
Tupelo, young Beach, while in a charge upon General 
Smith's command, was captured, and at the time was 
wearing my spur. The strap of the spur had on it a 
mark made by me, and while Sergeant Abbott was 
observing some passing prisoners, a few hours later, his 
quick eye detected the mark upon the strap, and he re- 
quested Beach to give the spur to him. When Abbott 
went North to recover from his wound, a short time 
after, he carried the spur to my home, and there I found 
it a year after. What the subsequent history of Beach 
was I never learned. At length we arose to continue 
our march to the rear, but stood for a moment looking 
toward the moving troops. Hearing my companion 
utter something, I turned toward him, and was aston- 
ished — yes, thunderstruck — to hear him demand if I had 
any money. He had up to that moment been the soul 
of honor and magnanimity. The protection he had 
extended me only a short time before had been so 
manly, so noble, I would gladly have given to him in 
thankful repayment my last penny or any honorable 
service, and the shock of disappointment was as painful 
as the sudden rupture of years of friendship ; but with- 
out replying to his question, I drew my wallet from 



A BIT OF ADVICE. 



71 



its pocket and, turning away my face, handed it to him. 
He did not step forward to take it, and feeling that his 
conduct was strange, I looked toward him. His face 
was troubled and flushed with mortification. Still ex- 
tending the wallet, I stepped toward him, when, with 
an exclamation of manly resentment, he motioned me 
to retain it. He was visibly chagrined, and in a mo- 
ment said : " I am sorry to be mistaken for a robber, 
and more sorry that the treatment of prisoners by our 
men warrants any Northern soldier in regarding so 
many of us as robbers. Nothing could induce me to 
take from a prisoner anything he desired to keep for 
himself; but when you are turned over to the keeping 
of others of our men, I am ashamed to say you will be 
robbed. I wish it were otherwise, but it will not be 
so. I have never been a prisoner, but men of my ac- 
quaintance who have been tell me that only in the 
rarest instances are your men robbed, and then always 
by some contemptible whelp like that red-headed puppy 
whom we met a little while ago, and who are despised 
as much by the majority of your men as I detested that 
fellow. And I have known of many men who spoke 
of being treated very respectfully by your soldiers, and 
even being given money and tobacco when they had 
little or none themselves. The only reason I spoke to 
you about your money was to suggest that you should 
hide it, for our men will certainly take from you every- 
thing you have of value." I had in "greenbacks" 



72 CAHABA. 

fifteen dollars, besides a dollar or two in " fractional 
currency." The fifteen dollars I rolled into a compact 
pencil shape, and cutting a hole on the inside^ of the 
fly of my pants, I crowded the money into that place. 
A gold pen and silver holder was put into the same 
place. The " fractional currency," by the advice of my 
friend, was left in the wallet, for he said, " If the pro- 
vost guard find no money in your wallet they will 
mistrust that you have hidden what you have, and 
their search will be all the closer." I had two pocket 
knives — one of average size, the other a small penknife 
that I had found in Memphis a few months before. 
The penknife I put in the waistband of my pants; the 
other, as more bulky and less easily concealed, I left 
in the pocket. A few months before I had bought a 
good hunting-case watch, which I was quite anxious to 
keep. It could, if necessary, be sold at some time in 
the future, and should be able to furnish much for 
comfort. Taking off my hat, I cut a hole in the lining 
large enough for the watch to be slipped into that hid- 
ing-place. But the practical wisdom of my friend (for 
such I now most sincerely regarded him), who was 
watching my acts with a deep interest, suggested 
that it would be a mistake to try to secrete the watch 
there or anywhere else. " Your hat will be taken off 
your head the first thing, and some old dish-rag of a 
thing thrown to you instead. When the other chap 
finds the watch in it you will be searched all the closer. 



GENERAL BUFORD. JT^ 

I tell you, boy, I have seen so much of this that I know 
exactly how you will fare. Leave the watch in its 
pocket, and you may be able to save some of your valua- 
bles." Beach did not prove a true prophet in all things, 
for I retained my hat as long as I was in prison, and 
only exchanged it in Vicksburg for a new one furnished 
by " Uncle Sam." The money and penholder I was 
able to conceal until we arrived at Cahaba, but of them 
at another time. We were ready now to proceed, and a 
walk of half a mile brought us to a respectable-looking 
farm-house, back from the road eight or ten rods, with 
large shady trees between the house and the road. A 
few plain chairs were scattered about the lawn under 
the trees, and in these were seated General Buford and 
a portion of his staff. Others sat cross-legged on the 
ground, or reclined upon the grass, or leaned against 
the trees, chatting pleasantly among themselves as we 
drew near. The guard, who knew General Buford's 
face, proceeded directly to him, and giving a slight 
military salute, reported in usual form the capture of a 
prisoner. The general asked him in a low voice two 
or three questions, and I overheard Beach say, " The 
' Yanks' drove our picket in with a good deal of spirit, 
and came close up to our breastworks. They must 
have been much injured by our fire, for we could hear 
a good many groaning in the thicket near by as soon 
as our firing stopped. This fellow was pulled over the 
breastworks by one of our men. He seems to know 



74 



CAHABA. 



what he is talking about. He says that Smith's whole 
army was close behind his command." The allusion 
of Beach to the information possibly to be obtained 
from his prisoner was less gratifying than the knowl- 
edge that he believed our command was supported by 
a larofe force close at hand. General Buford's first 
words were : " Well, boy, what's your regiment ?" On 
being told that it was an Illinois regiment, he mani- 
fested considerable interest, and remarked that "he 
was somewhat acquainted in Illinois," and asked where 
the different portions of it were raised. On learning 
that Company "A" were from Rock Island, he in- 
quired regarding its officers, and seemed to know the 
names of one or two of them. He also asked who was 
the colonel of the regiment. I do not remember 
whether Buford had been an officer in the old regular 
army, but think he had known our colonel (A. G. 
Brackett, before the war a captain in the United 
States Third Cavalry) as a regular army captain. 
Leaving these questions of a more personal nature, he 
questioned regarding the strength of General A. J. 
Smith's command and of many other matters of which 
I had no doubt he was better informed than I was : 
how large was our force — were we sent out to fight 
Forrest or to move to some distant point .^ His ob- 
ject was simply to confirm opinions already formed, 
and perhaps learn some of the minutiae that might be 
of value. A few days before I had met, for the first 



GENERAL CHALMERS. 75 

time since the war, an old friend who was an officer on 
the staff of General Smith, and in a long conversation 
with him had learned much regarding the command 
not before known to me — the strength of the infan- 
try, cavalry, and artillery, the expectations of General 
Smith, the estimated strength of Confederates likely 
to be met. I had also learned much regarding General 
Smith himself, for my friend had been upon his staff 
for many months, and had formed a very high estimate 
of his military ability. So far as I had reason to sup- 
pose, General Buford possessed correct information. 
I gave when possible correct answers to his questions, 
and, so far as I deemed it possible to mislead him, 
tried to do so. In the same yard where General 
Buford had his headquarters I noticed leaning against 
a tree, near enough to hear all that was said, an officer 
upon whose coat-collar were the insignia of a briga- 
dier-general. During a moment's pause in the run- 
ning conversation, I quietly asked Beach, who was 
near by, the name of this silent, attentive man, and 
learned that it was General Chalmers. The discovery 
was of much interest, since I was fairly familiar with 
his history. Chalmers was the son of a former United 
States Senator; was previous to the war a lawyer by 
profession, and had taken a prominent part in the se- 
cession of his State. In person he was a rather small 
man, quiet in manner, asking only a few questions 
himself, but paying close attention to the questions of 



76 CAHABA. 

Others and their answers. He had by that time won 
an enviable reputation for personal bravery, and was 
more an object of interest to me than General Buford. 
He has been, since the war, a State Senator in Missis- 
sippi, and for several terms a Member of Congress 
from his adopted State. 

For fully an hour the conversation continued, since 
there was nothing occurring to the troops under Buford 
that demanded his attention, the talk relating prin- 
cipally to the expeditions of Sooy Smith, the Sturgis 
disaster, our own estimation of Sturgis, Sooy Smith, 
Grierson, etc., the acts of our troops in different parts of 
Mississippi, the sentiment of our soldiers regarding the 
employment of negroes as soldiers, the Fort Pillow 
affair, etc. Buford was a portly, fat-faced, jovial man, 
who often chuckled in the course of his remarks, and 
never seemed to take offence at criticisms not com- 
plimentary to the cause or men with whom he was 
allied. In dealing with the boy prisoner he seemed 
possessed of the good-nature that characterized the 
gigantic Brobdingnags in their treatment of the insig- 
nificant Gulliver, and regarded as amusing remarks 
that perhaps from one of more consequence would 
have been received in a different spirit. He several 
times suggested that we did not govern ourselves by the 
principles of civilized warfare, and at length asked, "If 
you consider yourselves as carrying on a civilized war- 
fare, why did your army burn Ripley a few days ago T 



RIFLE V. 



77 



Now Ripley was a village on the line of the retreat 
of the Union troops in their flight from the disastrous 
field of Guntown, and while our straggling forces were 
hurrying through it a few weeks before in disorder, 
after their humiliating defeat, many shots were fired 
at them from the houses of the village. I stated this 
fact to him, and suggested that if the Confederates 
used the houses to shelter themselves — used them as 
fortifications, we considered it proper tt) treat them as 
fortifications, and destroy them when captured. He 
did not admit that the statement as to their use for 
fortifications was correct, but turned the talk to the 
Sooy Smith raid, and with good-humored, bantering 
words spoke of the affection of the Northern soldiers 
and Northern Government for their "niggers," and 
wanted to know what we found so lovable about 
them that made us carry back from the Sooy Smith 
raid over five thousand colored people. Answering 
seriously, I informed him that in that five thousand 
were enough good, active, intelligent fellows to form 
a large regiment; that they were now doing duty as 
such at Memphis, and had permitted us to take an 
equal number of white soldiers from such less impor- 
tant service and put them in the field. " Those that 
are not fit for soldiers can be put to the work of 
building fortifications, working about the quarter- 
master's and commissary department, doing fatigue 
duty, and relieving white men from such work. The 



78 CAHABA. 

average wenches are utilized for cooks, and the better- 
looking ones are appropriated by the officers. Per- 
haps some of your officers can tell me more than / 
know about this subject." Shaking his sides with 
laughter, he said, " Well, you seem to know what 
niggers are good for. Guard, you can take this fellow 
back to the provost guard now." 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE PROVOST GUARD PROCEED TO TAKE AN INVEN- 
TORY OF THE prisoner's PERSONAL PROPERTY HE 

RECEIVES MANY UNDESIRABLE ATTENTIONS RE- 
MARKABLE INSTINCT OF THE AVERAGE PROVOST 

GUARD ANOTHER "BOY IN BLUE" MISERY LOVES 

COMPANY TAKEN TO THE REAR OF THE BATTLE- 
FIELD OF TUPELO. 

THE provost guard were farther down the road, 
and after inquiring more particularly where to find 
them, Beach started with me toward them. Scarcely 
had we come within their sight when two or three of 
their number, who seemed almost to have been on 
the watch for their legitimate prey, came toward us. 
Their advance at first was hesitating — they were hard- 
ly certain whether the stranger was one of their kind 
of prizes or not. But a nearer view showed them a pair 
of blue pants, and an unarmed prisoner by the side of 
an evident guard ; and each then enlivened his step. 
Beach noted this, and turning to me, laughingly said, 
" Now may the Lord have mercy on you, for these 
fellows don't look as if they were coming on errands 



8o CAHABA. 

of mercy." That an errand of mercy was somewhat 
foreign to their mission was evidenced by a salutation 
of one when he was distant two or three rods — " G — d 
d — n you, let's see your boots !" Very evidently 
boots, and not any desire to perform angelic deeds, 
were uppermost in his mind. A few days before my 
foot had been injured, and to relieve the pressure at 
the injured point several parallel slits had been made 
in the leather. That particular boot was presented 
for his inspection. He was disgusted, but did not fully 
decide not to exchange with me until he had com- 
pared the size with his own. He could not possibly 
squeeze his "No. lo " foot into a "No. 6" boot, so di- 
rected his inquiries to other articles of mine that were 
more available. 

Beach walked with me to the officer in charge, and 
delivered his captive over to his custody. Quite soon 
an inventory was taken of the worldly goods in my 
possession by several of the guards. One appropriated 
my pocket-knife, another took the small change left in 
my wallet, a third transferred to his own pocket some 
trinkets he found in mine, and the officer in command 
said he would take my watch for fear it might be 
stolen. He remarked that it would be turned over to 
the next officer in whose custody I might be placed. 
It was kind in him to guard my interests so well ; but 
unfortunately, like many another man with good inten- 
tions, he was dreadfully absent-minded ; for when I 



PERSONAL PROPERTY APPROPRIATED. 8 I 

inquired for my watch at Okolona a few days after, I 
was told that the provost officer had forgotten to send 
it along. Till then I had really placed confidence in 
his words. Whatever may have been the other imper- 
fections and moral blemishes justly attributable to the 
average Northern soldier who served in the West, 
I believe he usually regarded the taking of personal 
property other than weapons from the pockets of his 
captives as ignominious. The Western soldier only 
is spoken of, as non-acquaintance with the Eastern 
army permits of no expression of opinion. Yet no 
one should infer from this statement that he religiously 
respected the rights of all others at all times. Beach 
manifested a loathing of the robbing of a captive equal 
to that of any of his foes. During and for some time 
after the Civil War much bitterness was entertained 
against the Confederates by the soldiers and people of 
the North for their practice of taking from captives so 
large a portion of their personal effects. It is probably 
safe to state that a half or even more of Union sol- 
diers, especially when taken in small squads, were com- 
pelled to deliver over to their captors blankets, boots, 
hats, the contents of their pockets, and sometimes even 
their body clothing. In a small proportion of cases 
dilapidated or worthless articles of the same kind 
were given in return, and these unwilling exchanges 
were called a " swap." Such acts were characterized by 
the captives as mean and shameful, and a comparison 



82 CAN ABA. 

as to the treatment of the captured Confederates was 
often made that was disparaging to the Southrons. 
Among prisoners there was a general feeling that their 
treatment in that particular was infamous. Yet it 
must be admitted that the conduct of the Confeder- 
ates in the matter of stripping their captives might be 
excused when we remember that though they them- 
selves, when taken in battle, were probably more 
generously treated than they had treated their prison- 
ers, their homes were often stripped of everything 
eatable or of value. 

When the absent soldier received from his wife a 
letter describing a visit from those she styled " modern 
Vandals," and told of the horses ridden away, the 
mules seized for draft animals, the cattle and swine 
and poultry killed and eaten before their eyes by a 
hungry horde, the corn fed to regiments of cavalry 
horses or piled into great government wagons and 
hauled away, the meat-house broken into and robbed 
of hams, shoulders, and side-meat, the house entered 
and meal, flour, sugar, coffee, eggs, milk, and syrup 
spirited away, sometimes by men with courteous man- 
ners, sometimes by rough boors, he lost fastidiousness, 
had fewer scruples about taking things, anything 
and everything, from those of his foes whom the for- 
tunes of war might throw into his power. 

The Northern soldier justified his acts by the 
fact that his antagonists were rebels, and as such, by 



SERGEANT TEER. 83 

the common usages of nations, they forfeited claims 
that would be accorded an independent nation. The 
ordinarily generous treatment of his Confederate cap- 
tive by the Union soldier in his opinion bespoke a 
similar treatment for himself. The treatment that the 
home of the Confederate received made him excuse 
the harsh treatment of the Union prisoner by himself 
or his comrades. How our different situations mod- 
ify our views ! The provost guard was a detail from 
a Louisiana regiment, though some of them were citi- 
zens of Mississippi. It consisted of the considerate 
lieutenant who forgot to forward my watch, Sergeant 
James Teer, a corporal, and eight or ten privates. 
The lieutenant held himself aloof from his command, 
and was little seen. The corporal and privates were 
average men, some fairly companionable, others more 
distant ; but with Sergeant Teer social intercourse was 
quite easy. His home was at some small town south 
of Jackson, Miss. (Hazlehurst, I think). A man 
slightly past young manhood, he had been in the Con- 
federate Army from nearly the beginning of the war. 
Possessed originally of a pleasant, easy-going disposi- 
tion, his three years of soldier life had rather confirm- 
ed his good-tempered tendencies. He cared little to 
manifest his authority over his men, and while he 
himself extended to his captive the good-humored 
manner innate in him, he never prohibited any 
amount of swearing at his prisoner with which spec- 



84 ' CAHABA. 

tators, and sometimes ev^en his privates, regaled them- 
selves. As I was the only prisoner in the possession 
of the provost guard, an innumerable number of 
questions was asked by the members of the regi- 
ments near by, and memory recalls that day as one 
floating in a haze of interrogation points. The same 
questions were asked over and over again by different 
persons as they came by, and were no sooner an- 
swered than a fresh arrival would come forward and 
repeat the questions with some variations. It was not 
difficult to maintain a conversation, for every man of 
General A. J. Smith's command was fully possessed of 
the belief that in the contest our arms would blot out 
the disgrace with which, by the miserable conduct of 
General Sturgis, they had been clouded. Even to 
this day, when I meet with a soldier who was present 
at the Sturgis disaster, the mention of the occasion 
w^ill always bring the hot blood of resentment to his 
cheeks, and the same feeling at that time made every 
man, from colonel to private, determined that victory 
should be ours. And the feeling was strengthened 
and intensified by the knowledge that in General 
Smith we had a leader worthy of the troops he com- 
manded. The certainty of success gave to the men a 
buoyancy and exhilaration such as I venture few 
armies possessed during our whole war. Remarks 
directed to the single prisoner, however, were not all 
civil questions. Men would ride close to the position 



AN UNCONGENIAL ATMOSPHERE. 85 

of the guard, and looking steadily for a few moments 
at their prisoner, would hiss out, " D — n the white-liv- 
ered, blue-bellied devil !" " Dog-on his ornery heart, I'd 
like to shoot him !" And in a moment of quiet, dur- 
ing a conversation with some civil fellow, often would 
be heard from a cantankerous chap behind him — 
" D — n the abolition puppy, I'd like to wear him out !" 
And thus filled with the most intense pleasure (if 
pleasure can be born of vindictive thoughts) at the 
prospective victory, and filled with a bitter resentment 
at the scurrilous, insulting epithets poured out so free- 
ly, the hours of the day passed by. Just before 
dark — the sun had gone down, and twilight had set- 
tled upon the place — two Confederate soldiers were 
seen a short distance away approaching our location. 
A few steps in advance of them was a man dressed in 
blue, evidently a prisoner who had been picked up 
during the day. At first there was a possibility that 
he was one of the enemy, wearing a portion of the 
uniform of a Federal ; but as he came nearer all 
doubts v/ere removed, for several of the guards, who 
seemed possessed of a marvellous instinct for recogniz- 
ing a Federal prisoner — an instinct allied to that of 
the buzzard in the neighborhood of its spoil — eagerly 
went toward him, and without the formality even of 
saying " by your leave," began an inspection of his hat 
and boots, and asked an inventory of his pockets. 
What a revulsion of feeling in me the blessed sight 



86 CAHABA. 

of that man produced ! A vision of the blue vault of 
paradise filled with the bright faces of friends who 
have gone before could not have been more beautiful 
to me at that time than was the sight of his blue uni- 
form. All day, save from my friend Beach, hardly a 
kindly or even a civil word had been addressed to me. 
Not a half hour had been passed in which impreca- 
tions, oaths, and malevolent wishes against me had not 
come to my ears. As much comfort would be given 
to a vicious and dangerous wnld beast that a rural 
community, with much painstaking, have entrapped ; 
every breath I had taken seemed drawn from an at- 
mosphere of ill-will or hatred. True, I could not un- 
reservedly censure my antagonists ; for doubtless 
among them were men whose homes had been ren- 
dered desolate by our own command ; but that possi- 
ble fact only rendered my enforced abode with them 
more uncomfortable. I had eaten nothing since early 
in the morning, and blessed with vigorous health, the 
pangs of hunger were hard to endure ; but the social 
hunger for a sympathetic look or word was greater 
than the physical. There was nothing in the personal 
appearance of the new-comer that ordinarily should 
awaken strong emotion, but his coming, the uniform 
he wore, the fact that he was a Federal soldier, a com- 
rade, appeased the spiritual thirst, the yearning for 
companionship, and my heart went out to him as it 
had ne'er gone out before to any human being. I 



A COMPANION IN MISERY. %"] 

could have cried for joy as he approached us. As the 
stranger drew nearer, and saw another in the same 
condition, his face became less downcast, and in a few 
minutes we seemed to each other to have had an ac- 
quaintance of years. His name was Frazier, of the 
Twenty-first Missouri Infantry ; he had been cap- 
tured at noon while the regiment was halted for dinner. 
Wishing some berries near by, he had walked a short 
distance from camp, and been " taken in" by a couple 
of Confederate scouts who were watching our forces 
from that point. Frazier was not the best type of a 
soldier, so far as military bearing and appearance went. 
He talked but little even when questioned, and when 
cursed by the Confederates for being in the Yankee 
army while he was a Missourian, he bore the abusive 
epithets applied to him in silence, or offered but a 
weak defence. Two or three bystanders, before he 
had been in charge of the provost guard ten minutes, 
expressed their disgust at his political apostasy, and he 
pursued the policy of pleading a sort of passive guilt 
that he might lessen his punishment. 

By this time it was quite dark, and the commander 
of the guard decided to move from the place where 
we had spent the day. The new place of bivouac was 
distant about half a mile, and was an open field by 
the side of a piece of woods sufficiently free from un- 
derbrush to afford an excellent place for caring for 
their horses. The wooded part near by was appropri- 



88 CAHABA. 

ated by the guard, while a part of the open field, 
about two rods square, was designated as our quarters 
for the night. Four guards were placed about us, one 
in each angle of the square facing inward. Neither 
Frazier nor myself had a blanket ; each had only a 
shirt, hat, pants, and boots. Although it was midsum- 
mer and the days were hot, yet we knew that a heavy 
dew was usually formed during the night, and could 
we but be permitted to seek the shelter of a tree, the 
situation would have been more endurable. A request 
to this end was peremptorily refused with what 
seemed to us more surliness than was necessary. 
Then we asked the guard if he could not let us have 
some sort of a blanket to keep the heavy dew off. 
'' I don't know nothin' about anybody 'at's got two 
blankets," was his reply. " Well, then, could you not 
get us a horse blanket or a piece of one ?" I inquir- 
ed. " I reckon there ain't none for you," was all that 
we could get out of the churl. So we learned with- 
out further investigation that that open piece of field 
was ours, and there was no use in trying to have it 
modified or improved. We could use the green 
sward for our mattress, and the starry canopy only 
could we have for our covering. 

We made the best of our surroundings, and lay 
down on the ground together as close to each other 
as possible, and chilled and shivered through the 
night, and perhaps were lost in sleep a part of the 



IN DREAM-LAND. 89 

time, until about half-past two, when the order came 
for the command that was camped all around us to 
saddle up and move out. Near us, by the side of a 
large log, some of the soldiers had built a bright fire, 
for the purpose of cooking their breakfast, and after 
they were gone we asked the guard (not the one of 
the previous evening) the privilege of going near the 
fire to warm ourselves, for we were chilled through 
and through ; and the request, to our surprise, was 
granted, and Frazier and myself were soon compara- 
tively comfortable, and again fell asleep, before the day 
dawned, by the side of the burning embers. How 
long we had lain there I do not know — probably two 
or three hours. The exposure and fatigue of the pre- 
vious day rendered sleep most delicious. In dreams I 
was back with comrades and friends, and was telling 
them of the manner of my capture ; of the deception 
practised to impress the enemy with the belief that 
they were to be charged by a strong force ; how the 
deception had caused them to move back into the field 
behind them instead of attempting the capture of our 
battalion ; of the long conversation with the Confed- 
erate general ; of the rather unpleasant experiences 
of the remainder of the day, when a conversation 
carried on by our guards and some citizens aroused 
me to semi-consciousness. Dream and reality were 
queerly mixed, yet there remained enough of the 
dream to make the situation decidedly pleasant. The 



go 



CAHABA. 



sun had warmed the atmosphere. The noise and hum 
and hurry of a few hours before had vanished, and a 
stillness, a sweet stillness, like the Sabbath mornings 
I knew in childhood, possessed the vicinity. The con- 
versation ceased for a few minutes ; then, beginning 
again, awakened me sufficiently to bring back the real- 
ity of my surroundings. Two old farmers, living a mile 
or two away, had come to the place where the army 
had bivouacked the night before, and finding the whole 
body departed except the dozen guards, had drawn 
near to them. Frazier had awakened some time be- 
fore, and sitting down on the opposite side of the log, 
was being plied with questions by these old dullards, 
who, learning that he was a resident of Missouri, were 
upbraiding him for his apostasy in being in the North- 
ern army. Poor Frazier, though possessed of strong 
convictions and (as an intimate acquaintance in later 
months convinced me) of unswerving loyalty, he had 
probably never entered into a discussion of the sub- 
ject with any one, and weak and shallow as were 
their arguments, he was wholly at their mercy. The 
first of the conversation had taken place before I had 
awakened, but from the remarks of the old men it was 
evident that they had drawn out from him the fact of 
his residence in Missouri ; then they had sneered at 
him for being a Southern man and serving in the 
ranks of the abolitionists. " What do you uns want to 
come down here and pester us for ? " etc., etc. As on 



FRAZIER UNDER FIRE. 9 1 

the previous evening, when the same stereotyped 
questions had been asked him, Frazier half assented 
to the justice of their position by pleading ignorance 
of the causes and conduct of the war, and offered only 
weak excuses for being in the Union army. 

One of the guards, who took quite an interest in 
the colloquy, seemed to have as little esteem for the 
old citizens as if they had been in Frazier's place, and 
especially seemed to wish that Frazier would be more 
than a match for them in the argument ; for citizens, 
as a rule, were detested by Confederate soldiers, even 
though they were, by reason of age, exempt from mil- 
itary service. After listening to the one-sided argu- 
ment for many minutes, when they had driven Frazier 
into silence, the guard turned to them and said, "Well, 
old gents, you seem to be too much for this fellow, but 
you'll strike a ' Yank ' now and then that kin wind 
you round his finger. Don't jedge 'em all by this 
chap." Although I had been fully awake for many 
minutes, I feigned sleep for a short time, and when at 
length I sat up, the old " Butternuts " tried to start 
a controversy with me. But I felt it would give 
them too much satisfaction, and kept silent as long 
as they remained with us. 

No food of any kind was furnished us the first day, 
but in the forenoon of the second day some hardtack 
and bacon was brought to us, and we were hungry 
enough to regard it as a royal feast, only that the 



92 



CAHABA. 



quantity was exceedingly limited. The first day, while 
so many strangers, men from other regiments, were in- 
terviewing us, our guards were exceedingly distant 
and gruff; but after the main body of the army had 
gone away, and our numbers were but few, a friendly 
intimacy was manifested by several of the guards, and 
even those who had been so disobliging on the day 
before were now fairly civil. Near by was a small 
creek, in some places deep enough to bathe in easily. 
We asked permission to go to it and bathe, and a 
couple of the more obliging guards volunteered to ac- 
company us. At night, while we were not supplied 
with blankets, we were permitted to gather wood and 
build a fire near a low-limbed tree, and the guards re- 
plenished it during the night, and stood by it for their 
own comfort. The night was much more comfortable 
than the previous one, as the tree sheltered us from 
the heavy dew, and on waking we were more refreshed 
than at any time since our captivity. 

Early in the morning of the third day (July 14th) 
an order came for the guard to move north, and to 
the rear of their main army. There was no com- 
mand to move with haste, only the bare direction 
for such a move, so we sauntered along leisurely 
toward the specified place until a little past noon, 
when we heard the " thud " of a distant cannon, an an- 
nouncement that the battle of Tupelo had begun, and 
our pace was quickened. In half an hour we met a 



BATTLE OF TUPELO. 93 

citizen who, in reply to the questionings of our guards 
seeking information, exultingly told us that " our men 
had got them into a good place, and are now just be- 
ginning to whip h — 1 out of them." Half a mile 
farther and another citizen, coming from the same 
direction, repeated the same story, and added, " Our 
men are just more than wearing them out !" But, 
notwithstanding such satisfactory reports, our guards 
were quite anxious to get to the rear of their army, 
and repeatedly urged us to walk as fast as we could, 
and even suggested that we take hold of the straps at- 
tached to the sides of their saddles as a further aid to 
locomotion. The next person coming toward us was 
a soldier, a courier carrying despatches to a command 
distant a few miles. He had just come from the bat- 
tle-field, and had witnessed just before starting an 
unsuccessful charge of the Confederates upon one of 
our strongly posted lines. The exultation so plainly 
visible upon the faces of the citizens was absent from 
his, and in reply to a question from Sergeant Teer 
as to how the battle was progressing, he halted his 
panting horse for a few moments, and a deep shade of 
concern was on his countenance as he told the ser- 
geant in a low voice, " The Yankees are fighting like 
h— 1 !" 

Next we met three or four skulkers, one on foot, 
the others on horseback. Their stories were con- 
flicting, though in the main cheering to the Confeder- 



94 



CAHABA. 



ates. All this time we were approaching nearer to the 
combatants, and the dull thud of the distant cannon 
changed to a more pronounced roar. The sharp 
rattle of musketry became more and more distinct, in- 
creasing in volume until at times the separate volleys 
were continuous. Occasionally a distant yell would 
proclaim the beginning of a charge or some important 
event, and once or twice, after a fire of musketry more 
heavy than common, we heard a prolonged cheer that 
Frazier and I interpreted as an omen of victory to 
our comrades. 

We had passed the last skulkers but a few minutes 
when an officer came riding to us in haste, and with- 
out waiting to be questioned, said : " Our men have 
been fearfully cut up in one of their charges, but old 
Forrest will eat 'em up before he is through with 'em!" 
He also directed Sergeant Teer to pass through a field 
near by and follow an untravelled road for a mile or 
so, as that would be safer should any party of Yankees 
be thrown out on their flank. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

HUNDREDS OF EMPTY SADDLES — THE WOUNDED TEXAN 

HIS ORDER TO SERGEANT TEER MAJOR MORGAN 

FORWARDED TO OKOLONA THE AUTOCRATIC BOY 

GUARDS. 

I COULD scarcely credit the stories of the men who 
had told of our army being so roughly handled, 
for General Smith's command had come out for the 
express purpose of fighting — not to repeat the crim- 
inal, cowardly tactics of General Sturgis, nor to enact 
over again the retreat of General Sooy Smith ; and 
no army of equal numbers could, with safety to them- 
selves, treat them as inferiors. 

When the Confederate officer stated the result 
of one of their attacks, and expressed the opinion that 
General Forrest would "- eat them up " before he was 
through with the engagement, we could not help 
noting that he himself felt there was a possibility 
of our army not only taking care of the front of 
the Confederates, but giving them trouble on the 
flank ; and his suggestion to Sergeant Teer to get 
in the rear of the Confederates as quickly and with as 



96 CAHABA. 

little risk as possible seemed a contradiction of 
his prophecy regarding the promised cannibalistic 
performance of General Forrest. 

Hastening through the by-way pointed out to us, we 
came to a point quite to the rear of the Confederates, 
and there found a portion of their quartermaster's 
train and a large number of non-combatants and 
stragglers, as well as a few who had been to the 
front and were slightly wounded. 

We had been there but a short time when a large 
open space in the woods near us began to be filled up 
with men leading riderless horses, on the saddles of 
which I could occasionally see dark streaks of blood. 

The feeling of exultation that involuntarily arose at 
these evidences of their rough treatment by our 
troops was much modified and repressed by the 
remarks of the men who accompanied them, some of 
which we overheard as they passed. 

" Poor Sam," said one, "got a Yankee bullet 
through his lung, and we had to leave him where 
he fell off his horse." " Big Joe, of Company F, has 
lost his leg at the knee ; he fainted and fell off his 
horse, and when the doctor came along with the 
ambulance, he said ' that leg was a-goner. ' " Said an- 
other : " My poor chum will never ride any more ; a 
piece of a shell cut off the side of his head and killed 
him instantly, just as we were going into that charge." 

Men who go into battle, however, must expect the 



AN ARROGANT TEXAN COLONEL, 97 

chances of battle, and with such a reflection it was 
easy to dismiss all uncomfortable sympathy. It was 
doubly easy for us after having endured two long days 
of cursing and cowardly taunts. 

Sergeant Teer halted near a large tree, and under it 
Frazier and I sat down. We had been there ten 
or fifteen minutes when a colonel, with his arm band- 
aged and carried in a sling, rode up and hailed the 
guard angrily, mistaking them for skulkers, and de- 
manded what they were hiding out there for, and why 
they were not with their commands, as they should be. 
" We are guarding prisoners," replied the sergeant. 
"Prisoners .? where are they T asked the colonel, doubt- 
fully. Where we were sitting, as we were half hidden 
from view by the tree, we were easily overlooked, 
and under the circumstances the suspicions of the 
colonel were warrantable. Doubtless the sergeant's 
answer would have been satisfactory, but our delight 
at the fearful defeat they had received and were 
then receiving made me foolhardy ; so, when he asked 
where are the prisoners, I spoke out, " Here are your 
Yankees." " Yankees be d^d," was his only remark 
as he turned his back to us in contempt. 

Addressing himself to Sergeant Teer, he told of the 
severity of the battle still in progress, in which he had 
received, or pretended to have received, a bullet 
wound in the arm. 

At the end of his remarks he turned to me 
7 



gS * CAHABA. 

and asked, " How many men have you up yonder ?" 
His manner had been insolent, and his reference to 
our army in his conversation with Sergeant Teer had 
been maddening. 1 wanted to irritate him, so I re- 
pHed, " You have seen them since I have ; you ought 
to know." Then he asked the question again with an 
implied threat, and in turn I replied, " Why don't you 
go up where they are and count them, or did you try 
it and find it unhealthy?" The idea of a despised 
Yankee speaking to him in that manner was more 
than his official highness could endure. At the same 
moment an orderly riding near him spoke up, " We 

can make the son tell." The words 

of the orderly were as oil poured upon a flame. 
The rage of the colonel was at white heat. He swore 
at the guard and at me : at me for my impudence, 
at the guard for permitting it; and finally, exhausting 
his vocabulary of invective, fairly yelled, " G — d 
d — n you. Kill him, somebody. I will myself." 

While conversing with Sergeant Teer he had dis- 
mounted from his horse and fastened him to a small 
tree a little distance away. He had no arms on 
his person while pouring out his imprecations upon 
me, and as he screamed," I'll kill him myself," he went 
hastily toward his saddle, where his pistol was. During 
the colloquy between us I had arisen from the ground, 
and was standing as he turned to his saddle. One of 
the guards, with an oath, ordered me to sit down upon 



THE ENRAGED COLONEL'^ ORDER. gg 

the ground, bade me drop my arms down by my 
side, and swore with a horrible oath that he'd blow 
my d — d abolition head off if I dared to speak 
another word or move an inch. 

By the time the enraged colonel had returned with 
his pistol I was sitting with my back to a tree, my 
head thrown back, the guard pointing his cocked rifle 
at my breast, and I as completely under his subjection 
as the most exacting tyrant could wish. For the 
colonel to have carried out his threat with me in such 
a position would have been simply murder, and full 
of hatred as he was, he could hardly afford to do 
so cowardly or barbarous an act ; but turning to the 
guard, after cursing me again, he told them that a 
body of Yankee cavalry had been observed marching 
around their flank, possibly with the intention of 
attacking the Confederate flank or rear. He said : 

" If you hear any firing in the rear, and feel that 
there is a probability of their recapturing these sons 

, shoot them on the spot and take care of 

yourselves." 

He mounted his horse immediately and started off, 
but stopped a moment and repeated his order as 
to the disposition to be made of the prisoners in tase 

of an attack, and added, " I am the colonel of the * 

Texas Regiment, an' by I mean what I say." I 

did not plainly hear the number of his regiment, 
so cannot, unfortunately, give his infamous name 



lOO CAHABA. 

to history. I hardly think Sergeant Teer would have 
obeyed the order if there had been an attack upon 
their rear, but I was very glad to have the afternoon 
pass away with firing only in our front. 

During the year that we were stationed along the 
Memphis and Charleston Railroad, our command had 
scouted the country along its line on both sides in 
West Tennessee and Northern Mississippi very thor- 
oughly, and we had become quite well acquainted with 
many citizens. Among the number was a Mrs. Mor- 
gan, whose husband was a major in the Confederate 
service. She was a black-eyed, dashing brunette, 
whose tongue was never at a loss for words, and who, 
though she often gave our troops a smart verbal 
lashing with no seeming exertion, now and then gave 
utterance to some expressions that made me think 
much of her talk was "put on," and that at heart she 
liad no great hatred for the so-called " accursed Yan- 
kees." 

Near the spot where I was so sharply compelled to 
sit down and remain speechless during the episode 
with the Texan colonel was the headquarters of a 
commissary department. The officer in charge of the 
commissary stores, being near, had heard a portion of 
the conversation between the colonel and myself, and 
in due time came closer and entered into a conversa- 
tion with me. I felt that he did not fully sympathize 
with the cowardly colonel and the pusillanimous 



MAJOR MORGAN. lOI 

guards, so I was quite willing to reply to his questions, 
and soon was pleasantly engaged in a rambling dis- 
cussion of soldier life. At length some one spoke to 
him, calling him by the name of Morgan. Noting 
that his rank was that of major, I remarked to him 
that I knew a lady by that name whose husband I 
understood was a major in the C. S. A. In reply 
to this he propounded a question or two as to where 
the lady resided and where I had met her, etc., and 
upon being satisfactorily answered, he informed me 
that she was his wife. This proved to be a fortunate 
circumstance, and my partial acquaintance with his 
wife became a passport to his good-will, and he 
shortly afterward asked me if I was well supplied 
with food. I frankly admitted to him that we were 
not getting fat — that no sanitarian could be more 
careful to guard us from gluttony than were our cap- 
tors; and that, next to a desire for liberty and to lend 
a helping hand to hang that detested Texan colonel, 
would be the pleasurable sensation of a well-filled 
stomach. 

The statement was sufficient, and that evening, for 
the first time since our capture, did we have sufficient 
food to allay the gnawings of hunger. And when we 
parted from him the next morning he gave both 
Frazier and myself all the food we could stow away 
in our pockets and shirt fronts. It is not always 
judicious to tell a gentleman who is absent from home 



I02 CAHABA. 

much of the time that his wife is charming, but 
Frazier and I decided that we were gainers by the 
venture this time. 

On the morning following we were ordered to be 
taken to Okolona, a town on the Mobile and Ohio 
Railroad, distant about ten miles. 

We started at ten o'clock, and as the day was quite 
warm, and we walked the distance, it was about two 
P.M. before we arrived there. 

Arrived at Okolona, we were taken to the provost 
marshal of the town ; our names, company, and regi- 
ment were recorded, and we were then sent to the 
guard-house, a one-story wooden building that had at 
one time been a store, but, like most stores in the 
small towns of Mississippi, its proprietor had closed 
out his business and gone into the rebel army, or had 
fled to the woods to avoid conscription. 

In the guard-house we found a half dozen men, 
some Yankees, some rebels; the rebels had been put in 
for various causes : one was suspected of being a Union 
man ; another, although not accused of any such heresy, 
had not complied with some military orders ; another 
was supposed to be a Yankee spy ; and, although he 
claimed to them to be simply a private citizen, to me 
he privately admitted that he was a Northern man, and 
in full sympathy with Northern principles. 

I regarded the fellow with considerable suspicion, 
feeling that he was as likely to be a Confederate as a 



A UNION SPY. 103 

Unionist — probably because of his having expressed 
before some Confederates his contempt for and disgust 
of Northern men. He was especially irritating in his 
remarks upon " old baboon Lincoln," as he called him. 

When the soldiers were removed from Okolona, this 
man, who passed by the name of George Carlisle, was 
left behind ; and while we were at Meridian, we 
learned that, a few days after our departure, he enlisted 
in the Confederate Army, and deserted the first night, 
taking with him an abundance of pistols, a rifle, and 
one of the finest horses in the country. He was at 
that time a spy of General A, J. Smith — a most daring 
and trusted scout ; and when he made his escape, 
carried to General Smith information very much 
desired. 

Of men wearing the uniform of our soldiers, one was 
called Smith, and belonged to an Indiana regiment. 
In later months I learned that his name of Smith was 
assumed, and in all probability he was a bounty- 
jumper — a class of men possessed of no principle, who 
enlisted only for the bounty given, and deserted to 
enlist again and obtain another bounty. Another 
soldier was a member of an Ohio regiment who had 
been picked up while loitering behind his command a 
few days before. 

Our guards were boys of fifteen to seventeen years, 
and men too old or too feeble to do the severe duty of 
a soldier in the field. Of the men we had little to 



1 04 CAHABA. 

complain. They simply required us to comport our- 
selves as prisoners might reasonably be expected to 
do, and manifested no desire to give us unnecessary 
trouble. I wish I could say as much for the con- 
temptible young whelps who were their comrades. 

Not one of the soldiers who were there had been 
captured while having in their possession any of their 
cooking utensils, and none had been furnished to them 
by the Confederates. 

No fuel was provided for us except a few barrels of 
old, half-rotten chips that were scattered over the 
ground near the back door. Those on the surface 
were fairly dry and could be coaxed into a state of 
combustion by long-continued and vigorous blowing ; 
but no amount of labor could procure a blaze. The 
deeper layers were so damp that they were only fit for 
fuel when selected and carefully placed in the sun 
until dry. Scarcely any chip was larger than the half 
of a man's hand, so in making a fire it was necessary 
to place them carefully to have any draft of air 
draw through the pile. 

Our ration at Okolona was coarse corn-meal, a pint 
and a half a day. No salt, no fat, no meat, no bread — 
simply coarse corn-meal, and nothing was furnished to 
cook it in. The menu presented something of a con- 
trast to that which I have since seen. One man had 
a canteen, which we were allowed to fill with water 
from a well near by. The process of bread-making 



AUTOCRATS. IO5 

was devoid of all mystery. It required simply the tak- 
ing of a handful of meal in your hands and getting your 
comrade to pour upon it some water from the canteen ; 
when wet enough to stick together, this was made 
into a thin cake and placed upon the smouldering 
chips. Before it was so thoroughly smoked as to 
render it entirely unfit to swallow, the cake was re- 
moved from the pile and the repast was ready. To be 
sure, a part was burned to a coal, part was nearly raw, and 
all was saturated with smoke ; but when such food is all 
one can get, it is eaten to supply the demands of hunger. 

Bad as was our miserable food, it was better than 
those hateful young tyrants — autocrats — who were 
placed to watch over us. Their will was law ; their 
will was anything to remind us how fully we were 
under their control, and how helpless to resist them. 

One day a Union soldier was standing near a 
window when a citizen came along and, looking into 
the building, spoke to the guard, and also addressed a 
question to the Union soldier, to which he respectful- 
ly replied. He then asked the guard which were 
Yankees and which were Southern men. 

It was the custom, too common among the chivalric 
soldiers of the Confederacy, to change clothing with 
prisoners whenever they could be the gainers by such 
a swap ; so it was not always possible to know 
whether a prisoner was a rebel or a Northern man. 

At this time the " Yankee" had on a gray shirt and 



I06 CAHABA. 

gray hat ; hence the citizen mistook him for a Con- 
federate, and the guard had the same idea until another 
citizen told them he was not. At that moment the 
Yankee was standing near a window, looking out ; the 
guard asked him if he was a d — d Yankee, and he 
replied that he was a Union soldier. " What in h — 1 
are you near that window for, then ? G — d d — n you, 
go back thar" (into the back part of the room). Then 
he cocked his musket and aimed at him, swearing all 
the time. His rage knew no bounds. He made him 
sit down on the floor, against the wall, hold up his 
head, drop his hands, and ordered him to not move a 
hair's breadth so long as he was on duty at that time. 

When he had made him sit as still as a statue for a 
few moments, he turned to the citizen, and, with a man- 
ner full of self-importance, remarked : " There, that's the 
way I make the d — d Yankees mind when I'm around." 
He would have been glad if " the d — d Yankee" had 
been slow to do his bidding, for then he would have 
had a good excuse for shooting a " cursed blue-coat." 

There was no rule prohibiting us from looking out 
of the window; it was simply the whim of a boy 
brought up to despise Northern men, which became 
law for the time. In another hour all Union soldiers 
might have been driven to the window with as much 
tyrannical display. This little episode was but a fair 
example of what occurred at all hours of the day while 
we remained at Okolona. 



CHAPTER IX. 

FROM OKOLONA TO MERIDIAN THE ONE DAY IN 

NINE MONTHS WHEN OUR MESS HAD ENOUGH 

FOOD A RUNAWAY NEGRO J. J. FITZPATRICK 

ORDERED TO SELMA, ALA. 

THE Sunday after our arrival at Okolona, we were 
taken to the train and started for Meridian, dis- 
tant probably one hundred and twenty-five miles. The 
train, which had come from Tupelo, w^as composed 
of five or six passenger cars, all of which were loaded 
with the Confederate wounded from the field of Tu- 
pelo, except the rear car. In this car we found a dozen 
or more prisoners who had been captured during the 
previous few days, a runaway negro, and his slave- 
hunting guard. 

As it was Sunday, every station had a large crowd 
of spectators who had gathered there to see the 
wounded, many of whom were their friends. A large 
number had brought delicacies wnth them, intended as 
offerings to the wounded or their attendants. 

At the first station after leaving Okolona one or 
two ladies were about to pass some of their food into 



I08 C AH ABA. 

our car, but were prevented by the guard, who ex- 
plained that our car was filled only by " cursed Yan- 
kees." In fact, at all stations they tried to prevent 
our receiving any food. 

But as we stopped frequently, and often only for a 
few moments, so great was the haste of some of the 
donors to dispose of their gifts, that hardly would the 
train slow up before our windows (which fortunately 
were kept open) would be filled . with cakes, pies, 
baked and broiled chicken, boiled green corn, melons 
and sweet potatoes, intended, to be sure, not for Yan- 
kees, but for their own soldiers. Although our guards 
were exceedingly active to prevent all such mishaps, 
we had not passed a dozen stations before we were 
quite well supplied with food, while the quantity was 
usually increased at every succeeding station. 

How delicious that food tasted after the days of 
subsistence upon the wretched, smoky, charred meal- 
and-water mixtures of OkolonaJ And so hungry were 
we that everything, for a time, that was passed into 
our windows was devoured almost without masti- 
cation. 

By the middle of the afternoon, however, we had 
satisfied our hunger and began to save up what was 
not eaten, believing that we might need it in the 
prison to which we were being taken. 

That Sunday was the only day I passed in the 
Confederacy during which \ did not feel the gnawings 



FORTUNATE MISTAKES. lOQ 

of hunger, save when disease drove away all desire for 
any food, and made the sight of such as we could pre- 
pare doubly repugnant. 

It was a source of constant amusement to note the 
words and looks of the Southern women and the few 
men who had unconsciously contributed to our ne- 
cessities at the various stations we passed. They 
were in such haste to force their contributions upon 
us through the car windows (believing us Confeder- 
ates) that they heeded not the remonstrance of the 
guard until too late to retrieve their acts ; but when 
the fact that we were Union soldiers dawned upon 
them, it was indeed ludicrous to observe the expres- 
sions of self-reproach that were depicted upon their 
countenances. The men uttered a growl or an oath, 
the women scolded sharply, often saying, " Why didn't 
you tell us before T " I did tell you," would be the 
reply, " but you wouldn't pay any attention." " The 
nasty Yankees, I wish they'd all been killed," replied 
one. " Here, you Yankees, give me back my pies and 
chicken," yelled others. " We didn't want you uns to 
have it ; why didn't you tell us you were Yankees ?" 
and other similar remarks. 

No doubt our success in this regard was in a great 
measure owing to a happy thought of one of our 
number, to keep such of us as were dressed in gray, or 
partly so, next to the windows. As I had on a gray 
shirt and hat, I had an opportunity to reply to such 



no CAHABA. 

questions and reproaches many times during the 
day. 

Among the new prisoners we found on the train 
was a man who belonged to the Twelfth Iowa Infan- 
try ; his nickname was " Pud," and in after months we 
became strong friends. A printer by trade, he was a 
young man of pleasant wit and much good-humor. 
He had been forced to swap clothing with his previ- 
ous guards, until he had no shoes, a ragged coat and 
pants, and a shabby hat ; but they were all gray. 

He sat just in front of me, and as he handed back 
empty dishes, he thanked the donors for their hospi- 
tality, and sometimes, in mock seriousness, upbraided 
his comrades for consuming such common food, when 
they had been feasted for days previous by tender, 
thoughtful, loving Confederates. His good-humor 
was contagious, and even our guard came to enjoy it, 
and sometimes purposely waited until too late before 
speaking to the citizens at the stations. 

The men nearly always growled or swore when told 
of their mistake, and only once did I hear any expres- 
sion of sympathy for us, and that came from a woman. 

About noon we passed through a small town, and 
when the usual scene was enacted, a young lady who 
had passed in her offering was told that we were only 
Yankees — prisoners. " Well," she replied, " I don't 
care if they are Yankees ; they are unfortunate, and 
are to be pitied, and I am glad I made the mistake." 



A RUNA WA Y NEGRO. I I I 

She was a blue-eyed, pleasant-faced girl, and as we 
heard her expression, so opposite to all we had heard 
before, we were half choked with gratitude ; and when 
the Iowa boy put aside his serio-comic words and 
heartily thanked her, many a " Good for you, little 
lady," was heard from our little band. In later 
months she was often spoken of with grateful feelings 
by those who were with us at that time. 

All day long the poor runaway negro sat crouched 
upon the floor, and near him was seated, upon a car- 
seat, the slave-hunter who was taking him back to a 
fate worse than death. Several times through the 
day I heard the white brute growl at the helpless 
black for having run away from a kind master, and 
worse than all else was his attempt to join the hated 
Yankees. Once I heard him say that when he got 
him home again he " would have cause to remember 
his attempted escape." Much as we disliked our own 
future outlook, we could not but think our condition 
and fate probably most fortunate compared to his ; 
and doubtless the negro was of the same opinion, for 
when he arose to leave the car, at a station some- 
where south of West Point, we observed a sickly, 
faint expression settled upon his countenance, and a 
sound — half a groan — escaped from his lips. 

In the early evening we rolled into Meridian, and 
were removed from the train to the stockade. 

Meridian at that time was only possessed of one 



112 CAHABA. 

house that was worthy of the name — the " Jones 
House" — a hotel situated near our stockade, perhaps a 
block away. All other buildings had been recently 
erected, and were one-story shanties made of rough 
boards and unpainted ; nearly all, I think, were used 
for military purposes. 

The previous February General W. T. Sherman 
had made a raid from Vicksburg as far east as Meri- 
dian, expecting our cavalry force, under W. Sooy 
Smith, to meet him at Meridian, and with him move 
on to Montgomery, Ala., or to some other point. Sooy 
Smith was an inefficient commander, and we were 
severely defeated at the battle of Ivy Hills, and but 
for the brigade of Grierson, and the faith we had in 
General Grierson, our whole command might have 
been worse defeated, perhaps captured. We returned 
to Memphis after having destroyed a vast amount of 
Confederate property, and carrying back with us five 
thousand able-bodied negroes, the major portion of 
whom were enlisted as soldiers. General Sherman 
remained at Meridian for a week, destroyed the de- 
pots. Confederate storehouses, rolling stock, tore up 
the railroad for many miles, north, south, east, and 
west of the town, heated the rails and twisted them 
about the trees, and learning that Smith was driven 
back by the force of General Polk, he returned to 
Vicksburg, leaving only one house standing at this 
important intersection of railroads. 



A STOCKADE. 



113 



The town before the war was one of little impor- 
tance, but the large amount of Confederate property 
gathered there in the early part of 1864 rendered it 
of more value at that time. 

Much of the land surrounding the hamlet was low, 
and covered with a dense growth of pine trees ; on the 
edge of the forest a stockade had been built, embrac- 
ing an acre of ground; the stockade consisted of the 
usual sixteen-foot logs stood on end and sunk two or 
three feet into the ground. Near the top, upon the 
the outside, a walk had been raised upon which per- 
sons could look down into the enclosure. Guards 
were placed at the front (and for that matter the only 
entrance) during the day, and during the night extra 
guards were placed about the stockade on the outer 
side. Two log-cabins were within the enclosure, each 
capable of holding (furnishing sleeping-places to) 
twenty or thirty men. When we entered we found a 
dozen or more persons confined for various reasons. 
One was a wounded negro Union soldier, who had 
been captured in some outpost near Memphis, and 
had received his wound while defending his post. 
One was a man from Skowhegan, Me., who had been 
a citizen of Alabama for many years, but who had 
never been in the rebel army. Several were deserters 
from the rebel army. Two or three had been con- 
scripted, and were being held there until they could 
be sent to their designated regiments. Two or three 



114 CAHABA. 

were citizens, vvlio were confined for reasons I could 
not learn. 

Of these latter, one was an old man, who would 
have been noticeable among hundreds. His tall form 
was stooped ; his long hair, once as black as night, 
was now streaked with gray, and brushed back from 
his brow, showed a noble forehead ; but most remark- 
able were his keen, flashing eyes. The guards always 
mentioned him as a political prisoner against whom a 
more than common crime was charged ; apparently he 
was a leader of uncommon sagacity and force. He 
never conversed with our men ; he would only answer 
questions briefly, always with urbanity. With Con- 
federates he was scarcely more communicative. I 
have always been deeply interested to know his fate. 

As we entered we were told that one of the houses 
had been assigned to the citizens, and that one we 
were prohibited from entering; the other could be 
used by as many as could get into it. By close pack- 
ing all our " squad " succeeded in being sheltered by 
it. As we had been bountifully supplied with provis- 
ions during the day, and needed only to have our 
names taken down by the provost marshal after our 
entrance, we quickly lay down, and, weary with the 
long, uncomfortable ride, were soon lost in sleep. 

When we had been up two or three hours the fol- 
lowing morning, a sergeant came into the prison and 
asked who was in command of our company, stating 



ACTING AS COMMISSARY SERGEANT. II5 

that he was ready to issue rations to us, and desired 
our captain and two men to go with him to obtain 
them. 

As we had no " captain," an impromptu election 
was at once held, and the writer was requested to act 
as a commissary sergeant for the balance of the men. 
Selecting two men to go with me, we walked down to 
one of the buildings used as a commissary depart- 
ment, and received two days' rations of meal and 
bacon. The quantity of meal per day was rather less 
than one and a half pints, and of bacon each man re- 
ceived a piece equal in size to the index and middle 
finger. As the meal was very coarse and filled with 
pieces of cobs and husks, and as frequently the bacon 
was " rusty " or wormy, I am safe in saying that there 
was no day when a man with an ordinary appetite 
would not only be able to eat his supply of food, but 
be hungry for another ration of equal amount. Salt 
was given to us in very small quantity, but no other 
food, no other article was added to our rations. 

To each squad of ten men a common cast-iron ket- 
tle (in some cases with an iron cover) was issued in 
which to cook our food. In this kettle we browned 
our meal, to be used in making meal " coffee ;" we also 
used it to boil our mush, bake our bread, fry our 
bacon, and make our " coffee." 

The kettle was thus in almost constant use, to do 
all this for two messes of five each, twice daily. But 



Il6 CAHABA. 

as we had nothing else to do, doubtless we could as 
well pass our time in waiting for that one kettle to 
come to our " turn " as in any other way. 

The first day after we arrived in Meridian, I was 
called before the provost marshal to answer some ques- 
tions concerning our little company. As he observed 
on his list that I was an Illinois soldier, he asked me 
from what portion of Illinois I came, and on my tell- 
ing him, he mentioned that he had formerly lived in 
Sycamore, which was only twelve miles from my 
home. Afterward we became quite well acquainted, 
and from him I learned that he had gone to Missis- 
sippi several years before the war as a railroad con- 
tractor. His name was J. J. Fitzpatrick ; by birth he 
was an Irishman. As soon as the war broke out he 
secured for himself the appointment of provost mar- 
shal of Meridian, and doubtless had made the office 
of some pecuniary benefit to himself To me he was 
always pleasant, sometimes even " chatty," seemingly 
on account of having lived in a portion of Illinois in 
which I was acquainted. To all others he was harsh, 
vindictive, cruel. One of his peculiarities was that 
he always gave his orders for the punishment of pris- 
oners with such a smile on his face as most men wear 
when performing an act that gives them pleasure, and 
such as is expected to please the recipient. His face at 
such times wore none of the lines of hatred. " Pud," 
our Iowa boy, after studying him carefully for a long 



A DISAPPOINTMENT. 



117 



time, declared he was the man whom Byron had before 
him when he described his Corsair, 

" As mild a mannered man 
As ever cut a throat or sunk a ship." 

Additions were daily made to our numbers of men 
captured in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana, un- 
til we numbered nearly a hundred. 

We had been in Meridian a day or two only when 
I with a young man named Grimes cast about for 
an opportunity to escape. Carefully looking about 
the prison and its surroundings, we determined to be- 
gin a tunnel, to complete which would require many 
nights, as work could only be performed during the 
night. 

The mouth of the tunnel must, of necessity, begin 
in one of the houses, for there was no place outside, 
near the stockade, where we could commence without 
being discovered. 

Hardly had we decided fully as to the proper course 
to pursue, when we were informed that on the mor- 
row we would be taken away to another prison in Ala- 
bama. This made any attempt at escape from Meri- 
dian seemingly impossible. 



CHAPTER X. 

PLANS FOR ESCAPE SENT TO CAHABA SEARCHED FOR 

VALUABLES IN CASTLE MORGAN " WHAT DO YOU 

HEAR ABOUT EXCHANGE ?" 

THE following day all soldiers in the prison were 
placed upon the train for Selma, and arrived 
there the same evening. Here we were placed in the 
third Story of a brick building, on the corner of two 
principal streets. 

As usual, we found other prisoners when we were 
placed in the guard-rooms, most of them being either 
Confederate deserters or persons guilty of some mis- 
demeanor against the Confederacy. One of those con- 
fined was a doctor who had lived in Texas, and 
claimed that State as his home. By birth he was an 
Irishman, and his travels had been extended to many 
portions of the world. Whether he was in sympathy 
with the Confederacy or not was a question concern- 
ing which one could not be fully assured. He claimed 
to be a Confederate, but some words of his made me 
suspect his loyalty to that cause, and even believe that 
he was either a Southern Union man or a spy in the 
employ of a Northern general. 



PLANS FOR ESCAPE. Ilg 

Another person whose acquaintance we cultivated 
was a conscript, kept there until he could be sent 
safely to the front. He was a strong Unionist, who 
had been brought from his home in Northern Ala- 
bama, where he said he had been hiding from the con- 
scripting officers for many months. He told me there 
were many Union men in Northern Alabama, and 
that if we could once escape to that part of the State, 
we would be aided on our journey by most of the peo- 
ple who resided there. 

Poor fellow ! he was as ignorant as a heathen, and 
his information was of the most meagre kind ; but 
there could be no doubting that his service to the 
Confederacy would be most unwillingly given. 

As in Meridian, Grimes and I were constantly dis- 
cussing the possibility of an escape, and in a short 
time agreed upon its details. The building in which 
we were confined was three stories high, our room 
being at the top. By the side of it was a store of two 
stories, and a window on the side of our building 
looked out over the roof of our neighbor. This win- 
dow was closed by boards strongly nailed over it, and 
as an additional security against the opening of the 
window, a small room made of boards had been built 
on the side of the room where the closed window 
was, completely covering it in. 

Our plan was to effect an entrance into the little 
board room, tear a board from the window, drop down 



1 20 CAHABA. 

Upon the neighboring roof, and reach the ground by 
the aid of a lightning-rod belonging to the building. 

A guard paced back and forth upon the only side 
upon which escape was possible, but we learned that 
in rainy weather he sought shelter just around the 
corner of the building, making only an occasional 
visit to his " beat." 

We effected an entrance into the little board room 
and loosened a board from the window ; then, care- 
fully concealing all evidence of having tampered with 
either, we waited for a favorable hour to assist us. 
Alas ! it never came. We only remained in Selma in 
all three or four days, and not a single day after our 
scheme for escape was completed. 

The food furnished us at Selma was more scanty 
than at Meridian, and the water was more scanty than 
the food. We had one small pail to bring water to 
a hundred men, and could only go for water when 
we could get a guard to go with us, which seemed 
to be quite a difficult matter to do. While get- 
ting our affairs in readiness — saving a portion of 
our crackers and bacon to supply us after we 
should escape, discussing the best course to follow 
to reach our lines — an officer came into our upstairs 
rooms and announced that a boat would be in from 
Montgomery during the afternoon, and on it all sol- 
diers would be conveyed to Cahaba. We hoped some 
accident would postpone the arrival of the boat over 



ARRIVAL AT CAHABA. 121 

one night at least, for the prospect was that an escape 
from Cahaba must be much more difficult than from 
any place in which we had before been confined ; but 
our prayers were of no avail, as the boat came in dur- 
ing the afternoon, and a little after dark we arrived at 
Cahaba, the prison destined to be our abiding place 
during the major portion of our captivity. 

It was raining hard as we left the boat and 
marched through the village to the office of the com- 
mander of the prison. While waiting for our names 
to be called, and to be searched for anything of value, 
we were turned into an empty room to escape the 
rain. Hardly had we been in the room a minute 
when a friend called my attention to a window that 
had been closed by boards nailed over it. 

Together we took hold of one of the boards, and 
were loosening it carefully, lest it should make any 
noise and betray our attempt. The lower end had 
been silently freed from its fastenings, when a nail broke 
with a loud noise, and at once a rebel guard came has- 
tening to the spot. There was not time for either of 
us to get through the window before the guard was 
near us, so we crowded to another part of the room, 
and blamed our ill luck for the accident. 

We waited in that vacant room but a short time 
before, " by squads," we were taken into the office of 
the commander of the prison to be searched. All 
prisoners who were taken to Cahaba were searched 



122 CAHABA. 

for any valuables that might have escaped the thieves 
who had guarded them previously. If any was se- 
creted and discovered by the searchers, it was confis- 
cated. If it was handed over to the searching officer, 
we were promised that it should be given to us should 
we be exchanged, paroled, or taken to any other 
prison. 

We knew that all, or nearly all, that we had dealt with 
before had no hesitation in taking anything from us 
that they could secure by quiet means, and not a few 
had no hesitation to resort to threats and violence ; 
but we believed, from the fair promises made by the 
prison officers of Cahaba, that we might be deal- 
ing with honest men ; and fearing lest what I had 
secreted upon my person might be discovered and 
confiscated, I handed to the searching officer all the 
cash I had upon my person (eleven dollars), and was 
passed along to the portion that had been searched. I 
did not, however, give up all my valuables. I had still 
secreted in the lining of my pants a gold pen and sil- 
ver holder and a good jack-knife. The knife was of 
some use to me afterward, but the pen was stolen 
from me by some of the thieves of our own party. 

Although the officers of the prison did not allow 
us to take into the prison any good knife, if we 
had been so fortunate as to have smugforled one into the 
pen, it was not usually taken from us afterward. I 
also kept a silk handkerchief, and this was retained 



^ EXCHANGING MONEY. 1 23 

until the next year, when I sold it to a citizen at Sel- 
ma for twelve dollars, Confederate money, and with 
the twelve dollars I bought two eggs at one dollar a 
piece and a loaf of bread at ten dollars ; but of that 
anon. 

When we were on the train between Okolona and 
Meridian, one of the prisoners was trading with one 
of the guards, offering one dollar in greenbacks for 
three in Confederate money. The trade had not been 
fully completed when the slave-hunter chanced to 
hear the proposed exchange. " Don't give three dollars 
of Confederate money for one dollar of the Lincoln 
scrip," said he ; " it ain't worth it. General Early is 
now [July 1 7th to 20th, 1864] moving on to Washing- 
ton, and within three months our men will hold that 
city, and Confederate money will be worth more than 
greenbacks." His words seemed to be accepted as 
true by the guards, so no exchange was made. But 
when we arrived at Cahaba, if any man had been so 
fortunate as to have kept his money and carried it 
into prison with him, he had no trouble in exchang- 
ing with guards at three and even four dollars for 
one. When we left Cahaba the next March, men 
who had greenbacks could obtain for them twenty, 
thirty, fifty, and even sixty dollars for one. 

The policy of taking the valuables of prisoners was 
not always carried out by force ; usually some excuse 
was given. *' You might try to bribe the guards," or, 



124 CAHABA. ^ 

" You might buy fire-arms," or some other senseless 
and gauzy excuse was offered as a reason for the act ; 
and the only reason why a few men had succeeded in 
keeping their money was that sometimes the dull, 
witless guards could find no good excuse for taking it. 

Making a distinction between the Confederate sol- 
diers who served at the front and the poor specimens 
of humanity who were our guards, there was no dis- 
puting the fact that our guards, as a rule, were not the 
intellectual equals of their prisoners. Material that 
was too poor to convert into soldiers for Lee and 
Johnson could be utilized in guarding prisoners. 

The person who assured us that if we gave our 
valuables into the keeping of the Confederate officials 
they should be returned to us, and that if we did not 
do so they should be confiscated, was the then com- 
mander of the prison, Captain H. A. M. Henderson. 
From a very slight personal acquaintance, from the 
reports of others, and from his personal appearance, I 
am of the belief that, had Captain Henderson re- 
mained in command of the prison, the promise given 
to us would have been fully redeemed. His prepos- 
sessing manner was an assurance to many of our com- 
rades of his honest intentions, and made them willing 
to give into his care whatever things of value they 
had heretofore concealed. But, unfortunately for us. 
Captain Henderson was shortly after promoted to the 
rank of lieutenant-colonel, and assigned to duty as 



IN CASTLE MORGAN. 125 

Assistant Commissioner of Exchange, a position in 
which he had no control of the affairs or government 
of Castle Morgan. I was told that some of the men 
who turned over to the officials at Cahaba their 
money, watches, etc., received them back wholly or 
in part ; but when I called for what was due me at 
the time of my leaving there, I was coolly informed 
that the books showed nothing to my credit. I 
could only reply that the books should have done so 
if they did not. 

After the official searching of the captives had been 
finished, we were taken to the prison, which has been 
described in a previous chapter. 

Once inside the stockade and inner walls, many of 
the prisoners who had been there confined for several 
weeks crowded about us to ask " from what com- 
mand we came," " where captured," " how was the war 
progressing," "was there any hope of exchange," etc. 
I answered many questions, asked a few, and select- 
ing an unoccupied space of sandy earth, was soon 
fast asleep. 

When the morning came, guards entered the prison 
and, causing all the inmates to stand in the southern 
end of the brick enclosure, a line of guards was 
formed through which we passed singly and were 
counted. Then we were allowed to pass out to the 
cook yard and begin our preparations for breakfast, 
the men being usually divided into messes of five. 



CHAPTER XL 

UNDER THE WATER-CLOSET AND OVER THE STOCKADE 
A HARD day's MARCH AHEAD OF US — WADING 

IN THE ALABAMA DOWN TO BUSINESS. 

PREVIOUS to coming to Castle Morgan, I had 
become quite well acquainted with a number of 
my fellow-prisoners, and, as has been stated, we had 
often together discussed the chances for making our 
escape. Those with whom I had conversed most were 
E. A. Gere, a former citizen of Ohio, but now a mem- 
ber of the One Hundred and Seventeenth Illinois Regi- 
ment ; Grimes, a member of the Fourth Missouri 
Cavalry; and D. E. McMillan (a nephew of General 
McMillan), a member of the Ninety-fifth Ohio Infan- 
try, who, at the time of his capture, was acting as 
orderly for his uncle. Grimes had had a startling his- 
tory, of which, in the course of time, I became 
possessed. Born in Virginia, a " poor white," unedu- 
cated, unselfish with friends, suspicious of strangers, 
under the control of a most violent temper and re- 
vengeful disposition if suffering from a wrong, real or 
fancied, he had enlisted in a Confederate regiment, 



GRIMES. 127 

and served in it for several months in Virginia. There 
he had some difficulty with another Confederate sol- 
dier, and while he did not so state in plain words, he 
led me to infer that in an affray he had so injured 
the Confederate that death followed. Certain it is 
that the result of the affray was so serious that he 
sought personal safety in flight, and in due time 
entered the Union lines as a deserter, changed his 
name, and enlisted in an Ohio regiment belonging to 
the Army of the Potomac. Here again a similar oc- 
currence drove him from the new service, and his next 
appearance upon the military stage was as a recruit for 
the Fourth Missouri Cavalry. When captured he had 
been a member of the latter regiment a few months 
only. The possibility of being recognized by one of 
the Confederates who might be our guards was an in- 
cubus that filled him with terror, for his fate in that 
event would certainly be death for desertion, if not for 
the act that led to it ; while he was equally anxious to 
be away from Cahaba, as he had learned that a num- 
ber of his Ohio regiment were among the prisoners, 
although they were to each other entire strangers. 
The quality that commended Grimes as a companion 
in a contemplated escape was his unchanging, earnest 
determination to secure his freedom. Gere was a rest- 
less spirit, who chafed under the restraint of prison life, 
and was always on the alert for any information that 
might be of value if we should succeed in any attempt 



128 CAHABA. 

to regain our freedom. An acquaintance with him 
confirmed a first impression, that he would be an ex- 
cellent comrade, as he possessed courage, vigilance, 
prudence, an inflexible determination to regain his 
freedom, and a tough, wiry body that would enable 
him to endure the hardships inevitable to any fugitive 
in his long, weary route through a land fihed with 
sleepless enemies. McMillan was a companionable 
boy of much suavity, intelligence, and honesty, but, as 
he was quite young, he had hardly the self-reliance 
that doubtless a few more years would have given 
him. We learned that guards were always placed be- 
tween the brick walls and the stockade on all sides 
during the night, but none were there in the daytime. 
We also were informed that explosive obstructions 
(torpedoes) were placed around the outside of the 
prison, and deep enough in the earth to be in the 
course of any tunnel. This was stated upon what 
seemed good authority, and was said to have been 
done a year before, after the escape of seven prisoners 
by tunnel. To escape by tunnelling also seemed quite 
impossible, for the reason that in digging a vast 
amount of earth must be disposed of, and there was no 
place for such disposition with the surroundings of 
the prison. Any quantity of earth poured into the 
water-closet would at once be discovered, and to 
place it out upon the ground among our men was to 
advertise the tunnel to all in the prison, and that 



ANOTHER PLAN OF ESCAPE. 



129 



would be fatal to any scheme ; for there were always 
some among our men who would at any time betray 
such a secret for a peck of sweet potatoes. This 
admission seems a severe reflection upon the honor of 
Union soldiers, and ascribes to them a venality to ad- 
mit which is mortifying; but it must be remembered 
that there were in our ranks not a few who had been 
the dregs of our large cities and the scum of the na- 
tion — men who had enlisted for the bounty paid by 
some towns, and who had no more of heart or sentiment 
in regard to the principles of the North than the 
swine with which they had been reared. A sentry 
was placed at the northeast corner of the brick wall, 
and one was also placed at the door of the water- 
closet (see diagram). The duty of the first was to 
watch the space between the brick wall and stock- 
ade; the second, to observe all who might pass into the 
the water-closet, and see that no one escaped through 
that possible avenue. As no guard was placed be- 
tween the brick wall and the stockade on the south 
side in the daytime, it offered one chance of escape 
that no other direction did. So, after much consulta- 
tion, we decided upon the following scheme : to have 
some of the men engage the attention of the guards at 
the two places named, while we should get under the 
floor of the water-closet and pass out into the space 
between the inner or brick wall and stockade, by 
crawling through the trough or open sewer which car- 
9 



130 CAHABA. 

ried the water and faeces. Once between the brick 
wall and stockade we were to quickly climb over 
the latter, which at that point was composed of small 
poles four to six inches in diameter, and these placed a 
few inches apart, that the sewer water might flow 
through. We had been in Castle Morgan only five 
days when the favorable moment was deemed at hand. 
On July 31st we had fully decided upon the course 
we would pursue. That night a heavy shower oc- 
curred, and among other of its good deeds, it gullied 
the ground at the entrance to the water-closet. In- 
side the brick wall, when this old cotton shed was first 
built, the ground had been raised to a higher plane 
than the ground under the floor of the water-closet, 
and the shower had washed away enough of the earth 
to admit of the passage of a man's body through the 
gully ; so that if the guard's attention could be ear- 
nestly attracted for a few minutes, it would be very 
easy to slip through the providential opening and 
crawl under the floor of the water-closet. Three of us — 
Grimes, Gere, and myself — had fully determined to risk 
our fortunes on the venture. McMillan was almost 
persuaded, but at length concluded the deed would 
be too dangerous ; but as he had on a pair of gray pants, 
which he had been compelled to receive in a " swap " 
with some Confederate, he gladly exchanged with me. 
The others had taken the same precaution, so that to 
a stranger we could, if not too closely inspected, 



A DESPERATE UNDERTAKING. I31 

easily pass for Confederate soldiers. I had on my hat 
one of the blue and gold hat-bands worn quite fre- 
quently by the officers of our army, but which were 
very rarely seen in the possession either of the Con- 
federate soldiers or officers. If one thing more than 
another was pleasing to the eyes of the Confederate 
guard, it was some such gewgaw as that band. Let 
others explain it as they may, the fact was patent to 
all who were brought in contact with them. This 
band I gave to one of our men, who at an appointed 
signal was to enter into negotiations for its sale with the 
guard at the water-closet. A fancy knife was at the 
same time to be handed to the guard outside, at the 
northeast corner of the shed, and active, earnest nego- 
tiations were to be continued, until it was certain that 
we were outside of the stockade, or discovered in the 
attempt. We had eaten our breakfast of meal " pone," 
a new relief of guards had been posted, and it was 
certain no change of guards would be made in the 
next hour, when we bade good-by to the few friends 
who were acquainted with our desperate proposition, 
and received their earnest good wishes. Men were 
constantly entering and coming out of the water-closet 
when we passed in. Casting a glance at the guard, 
and noting that he was deeply occupied in bargaining 
for the band, Gere, reluctant to attempt the passage 
through the opening so near to the feet of the guard, at- 
tempted to crowd himself through the " seat " of the 



132 CAHABA. 

closet ; it had, however, been made too small to admit 
of the passage of the body of any ordinary sized man. 
He was stuck fast ; but both of us, catching hold of 
him, he was pulled back in a second. Our only hope 
was to pass through the opening washed out by the 
rain of the previous night. This was within two feet 
of where the guard was standing, and should he chance 
to look down while either of us might be crawling 
through the " gully," he could not fail to observe us. 
It was but the work of a second for Grimes to glide 
as noiselessly as a cat to the opening, to glance eagerly 
at the guard, to place his feet in the opening, to glide 
under the floor on which Gere and I were standing. 
Gere seemed for a moment dazed at his failure to pass 
through the " seat," and while he was standing in sus- 
pense I repeated the act of Grimes, and was followed 
immediately by Gere. We waited a moment to listen 
if our action had been observed ; then one after 
another laid down in the trough, half filled with run- 
ning water, and crawling through its length, we were 
outside the water-closet. The first and most formidable 
obstacle had been overcome. Peeping through the 
crack of the boards between us and the nearest guard, 
w^e saw he was still intent upon his negotiations. A 
fflance to the other gruard showed that the friend who 
was to draw away his attention was most faithful to 
the duty assigned him ; then, with nervous hands, one 
seized the poles that formed the stockade, and with 



SCALING THE STOCKADE. 1 33 

the Strength of an athlete, the quickness of a sprite, 
was over the side in a minute, and immediately fol- 
lowed by the other two. When we jumped to the 
ground we observed a negro a few rods away look- 
ing at us ; but we were each dressed in gray, and saun- 
tered along leisurely through the portion of town near- 
est the prison. I have no doubt he mistook us for Con- 
federate soldiers off duty, who had scaled the stockade 
at that point rather than go to the front gate for exit. 
A few blocks away we noticed Confederate soldiers, 
and believed they must have seen us jumping from 
the stockade ; but if they had noticed the movement, 
the very boldness of the act, the improbability of 
" Yankee" prisoners escaping from so strong a prison 
in broad daylight, disarmed all suspicion, and made 
our dare-devil exploit the easiest possible method of 
escape. A far different story must have been told — if 
either of us had lived to tell it — had either of the 
guards observed our movements. A few weeks after 
a prisoner named Natty, a member of a loyal Louisi- 
ana battery, succeeded in getting between the water- 
closet and the stockade without looking back to see 
whether he was observed. He stood for a moment 
looking at the stockade, and just then put up his 
hand to scratch his ear, when " bang " went the gun of 
the guard within the water-closet, and a bullet clipped 
off the end of his finger that had been extended to the 
ear. The guard at the door of the water-closet had 



134 CAHABA. 

spied him through the cracks, and placing the muzzle 
of his rifle to the crack, had fired, intending to drive 
a bullet through his brain ; but the thick plank de- 
flected the leaden missile three inches and saved his 
life. Walking leisurely along through a corner of the 
town, we shortly came to the bank of the Alabama 
River, and along its side we strolled for a few rods ; 
then we entered the water. Our object was to leave 
no track on the ground that could be followed by 
the hounds, which we knew would be placed upon our 
trail, if it could be found, when our flight became 
known. For nearly half a mile we waded in the 
water ; then, coming to a steep bank where some strong 
wild vines hung from a tree and down the sides of 
the bank, we pulled ourselves up some twelve or fif- 
teen feet, and found ourselves on the edge of a rather 
shapely wooded grove. Crossing this, we came to the 
main road, but feared to cross it, lest we might be seen, 
as we were still in sight of the town. A short distance 
away we observed a culvert extending across the road 
sufficiently large to admit of our crawling through it ; 
so by creeping carefully from the grove to the road and 
through the culvert we gained another wood on the 
west side of the road, and started briskly forward tow- 
ard the west. 



CHAPTER XII. 

AN UNWELCOME SPECTATOR CLIMBING TREES TO ES- 
CAPE FROM HOUNDS A FALSE ALARM AN INVOL- 
UNTARY BATH SEEKING LODGINGS — SWIMMING 

THE CREEK THE NEGRO OVERSEER " YOU U," 

" YOU— U." 

OUR intention was to go west until we came to 
the Tombigbee River, and find a boat with 
which we could pass down the Tombigbee to the vicin- 
ity of Mobile, to travel thence across the country east 
to Pensacola, Fla. This seemed the most feasible 
route for several reasons. We believed that here 
would be less watch kept upon the Tombigbee for 
runaways, and there would be less likelihood of meet- 
ing boats upon it than upon the Alabama. It would 
allow us to travel with much more ease than upon the 
land, and as there was no organized Rebel army in 
that direction, we thought that there would be much 
less prospect of meeting with those who would take 
us back into captivity. Alas, " the best laid plans of 
men and mice" are often thwarted ! We had frequent- 
ly heard of the ease with which the dogs of the South 



136 CAHABA. 

would trail a fleeing fugitive, and were at a loss how 
to obliterate our tracks ; but Grimes had lived in the 
South, was born there, and he told us that fugitives 
sometimes rubbed the fresh faeces of animals upon 
their shoes or feet ; and, passing where a cow had 
quite recently passed we adopted his suggestion and 
repeated it several times during the day. Five or six 
miles on our road (we travelled always in the woods 
and through fields) we found it necessary to cross the 
main highway, and, listening for a moment and hear- 
ing no sound, we climbed over the fence. Just then 
a negro driving a span of mules moved into the road 
from an untravelled path near by. He had stopped 
just before we came to the spot, had taken down a 
pair of bars, and was waiting as we came up, having 
heard our steps and conversation. When we climbed 
over the fence he drove forward and we were within 
ten rods of him. Fearing that we would arouse his 
suspicions, should we pass on without speaking to 
him, we approached him and asked several questions, 
the direction to Cahaba being one of them. We 
stated to him that we were Confederate soldiers, and 
expressed surprise that we had become turned around 
in the forest, and started off as if to go to the 
last place on earth we ever wanted to see again — 
Cahaba. I have always felt that the negro strongly 
suspected our true character, and was friendly to us 
on that account. We changed our course as soon as 



AFRAID OF PURSUIT. I37 

we were out of his sight, resumed the journey to the 
west, and for the next two or three hours often 
stopped and listened for any unwelcome sound of 
pursuing hounds. No sound came, however, and after 
a few hours we breathed freer. In the afternoon we 
passed near several parties of negroes, but were al- 
ways fortunate in passing unobserved, until just be- 
fore nightfall, in crossing a crooked road, we looked 
back, and saw, less than a quarter of a mile away, a 
team and several slaves, but it was quite probable 
they did not observe us. We continued our flight till 
into the evening, when a very heavy shower compelled 
us for an hour or more to seek the shelter of a pro- 
tecting tree. During the day we kept the person in 
advance who could walk the fastest, and at the same 
time look out for any source of danger. As we were 
poorly shod, looking to the right, left and front, our 
leader would often hurt his foot, or scratch himself 
upon the thorns and briers, so to nurse his injuries he 
would be put in the rear for a time where he could 
more carefully watch his steps. Twice during the 
day we heard hounds barking, and once they came so 
near that we climbed trees to prevent their tearing us 
should they prove to be upon our tracks. They were 
doubtless stray hounds that had gone on a hunt on 
their own account, some animal having crossed their 
path. During the day we ate some raw green corn, 
that at that time was just " in the milk." It was not 



138 CAHABA. 

very palatable, nor of very much nutritive value, but 
it served to lessen our hunger. Shortly before mid- 
night we started forward again. The rain had ceased 
falling and we hoped to make a good number of 
miles before daybreak, and intended to sleep during 
the succeeding day. Although there was no rain fall- 
ing the sky was inky black, and it was impossible to 
see a rod ahead. We kept falling into water-holes 
and gullies, and all of us were soaking wet. The last 
dousing I received was by falling into a hole where 
a tree had been blown over, and its roots had ex- 
cavated a pit four or five feet deep. This was nearly 
filled with water, and on its edge I tripped over an 
unobserved root and fell headlong into the little 
pool. That settled the question for me, and the other 
two were willing to receive my testimony regarding 
the unpleasant sensation of the plunge without ques- 
tion, and accept my bath as an omen to seek lodgings 
until daylight. We found a piece of ground not cov- 
ered with water, pulled weeds from the earth, tore bark 
from a decaying tree, laid them so that they should be 
under our hips and shoulders when lying down, then all 
lay down as close together as possible, shivering much 
and sleeping little until the first blush of red appeared 
in the east. We were anxious lest we might be 
near a plantation, so we dared not remain on the 
ground after it began to grow light, knowing that 
the " hands" (negroes) were compelled to rise early, 



UNCOMFORTABLE TRAVELLING. 1 39 

and fearing we might be seen and betrayed. It 
would be hard to find, outside of a hospital for incur- 
able rheumatic patients, three more bent and stiffened 
cripples than we were on attempting to walk away 
from that bed of bark and damp weeds. For a mile 
my body was stooped almost to a right angle with 
my legs, while Gere and Grimes declared that their 
backs were out of joint ; but we soon entered a wood, 
and, getting warmer as the sun came above the ho- 
rizon, in another hour we were as supple as ever. 
How great the recuperative power of youth ! In the 
early morning we passed a peach-tree on the border 
of a plantation and secured a few small peaches, not 
of a fair quality had they been ripe, and they were 
several days short of being so. We heard human 
voices several times during the morning, but always 
avoided being seen. During the forenoon we came 
to a creek that had been swollen by the rain to a 
river six or eight rods wide, and much too deep to 
be forded. Neither of my companions could swim, 
so we undressed, and tied our clothes securely into 
bundles. I swam to the middle of the river, where 
they threw the bundles to me, and I transported them 
the balance of the way, and deposited them upon the 
opposite shore. Then one got a rail to support him- 
self with, and I swam him across, clinmno: to' it. The 
other could swim with a rail without help. We spent 
half an hour on the farther bank wringing the water 



140 CAHABA. 

from our clothes, and dr3ang them in the sun, and 
started on. A few miles beyond we came to a large 
cornfield, and had passed into it fifteen or twenty 
rods, when we heard field hands right ahead of us. 
These we dared not meet, so returned to the woods, 
and passed around the field, or rather started to do so, 
when Gere noticed a negro standing a short distance 
ahead of us apparently observing us closely. To 
have turned away would have been suspicious, so we 
approached him and inquired the way to the main 
road, which we already knew was half a mile to our 
left. The negro was evidently rather above his class, 
and, as it afterward proved, was the overseer of the 
gang in the field. He was very obsequious, strongly 
reminding one of a fawning cur, so servile was he in 
his anxiety to seem friendly. When he had replied 
to our questions in regard to the road inquired for, he 
said : " I'se mighty sorry I ain't got some millions 
(water-melons) here fo' ye ; I'd be powerful glad to 
gie yo' som', and if you'll jes stop here till I done fetch 
som', I'll bring ye som'." We thanked him, adding 
that we were rebel soldiers who had left our com- 
mand and were going to visit some friends a few 
miles ahead and did not wish to lose any time. 

His servile, fawning manner made Grimes suspi- 
cious of him, and when we had gone far enough to be 
out of his hearing, Grimes wanted us to go back and 
compel him to go with us until dark, or tie him to a 



AN ALARM. I4I 

tree and leave him gagged. Indeed, I believe he 
would sooner have had him killed than to let him do 
as he might ; but Gere and I had less fear of his be- 
traying us, and, though we took no formal ballot, we 
decided to leave him unmolested. So long as we 
were in sight of him we continued in the same direc- 
tion as when discovered ; then, turning at a sharp an- 
gle, we entered the cornfield again, and travelled fast 
for an hour. One after another field had been passed, 
and the fear of pursuit had nearly gone from our 
minds, leaving us without its stimulus. . During the 
day Grimes's boots had so galled his feet they became 
worse than useless, and, cutting the tops of them into 
strings and sandals, he was making them perform 
duty in that manner. Gere and I were but little bet- 
ter off, although our boots were still retained upon 
our feet. We were all as weary as we could be and 
drag ourselves along. Faint from want of food and 
sleep, we had determined to go only to the first 
place where we could lie down and sleep in safety. 
Had no new experience come to us, I am sure we 
could not have dragged ourselves along another 
mile. Three men more exhausted I never saw, and 
that we could move faster than a walk I would have 
considered an impossibility. Just as we had nearly 
passed through a large field of corn, Gere halted and 
listened ; he said he could hear the cry of hounds. 
A very faint "you," "you," could occasionally be heard 



142 CAHABA. 

that brought a feeling of uneasiness to us ; but after 
listening a moment, the sound grew fainter, and we 
resumed our weary march. Again the soft wind 
brought the dreaded sound nearer and clearer, and 
again we stopped and listened, until it ceased in the 
distance. What suspense ! Hardly had we once more 
started forward when, nearer, louder, more malignant 
and venomous, came that hellish "you," "you." Ah! it 
required no imagination then to decide the question. 
We looked at each other, and all saw faces pale with 
fear and sickening despair. For a moment I almost 
fainted. The sound had now come S0 near that we 
could plainly distinguish the yelp of many dogs. As 
our trail grew more fresh, their cries sounded sharper. 
'Tis said the hunter can tell from the cry of the hound 
whether a trail is fresh or old. A sickening, qualmish 
sensation ran over us, and the dullest imagination 
could see their hungry forms leaping forward, their 
heads bent to the earth, their white teeth and frothing 
mouths hungry to tear our flesh from the living body 
or bury their fangs in our throats. We were faint, 
but only for a moment; then, with the speed of fright- 
ened wild deer, we ran from the yelping, howling, 
maddened pack that just then burst into view behind 
us. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

RUNNING FROM THE DOGS RECAPTURED — GARRULOUS 

OLD HATCHER — IDENTIFIED THE INSTINCT OF 

FIENDS POSSESSED BY THE HOUNDS RETURNED 

TO CAHABA. 

A MOMENT before we were so weary that a 
dragging gait was the limit of possibility; a mo- 
ment after we were flying with the speed and spirit of 
the frightened roe. We had not far to go ere we 
came to the edge of the field, and at that Doint was a 
corral for the purpose of confining mules. Usually 
the fences provided for such use were much higher 
than ordinary fences, but this was certainly one of the 
highest I ever saw. Up this we climbed, just as the 
pack closed the distance between us. A short dis- 
tance behind we heard the shouts of men coming on 
horseback. So high was the fence that the dogs did 
not attempt to reach us by jumping, though two or 
three savage fellows came directly beneath us and, 
placing their fore-feet high on the fence, whined and 
growled and whined again in mingled disappointment 
and anticipation. The pack was composed of two 



144 CAHABA. 

bloodhounds and several " catch dogs " — a cross of 
the hound and bull-dog, bred for the purpose of 
combining ferocity and resolution, a cruel, relentless 
brute ; and woe betide the human prey that should 
fall into its power ! Sitting there looking down into 
those red mouths looking back, waiting for creatures 
wearing the forms of men, carrying, it seemed to us 
then, the souls of devils, life hardly seemed worth the 
trouble of its living. A moment later one of our pur- 
suers, a man past middle age, came into view, carrying 
a shot-gun or rifle. As soon as he saw us under the 
guard of the dogs, he shouted to his companion that 
we were caught. Covering us with his gun, he de- 
manded to know if we were armed. We told him we 
were not. " Have you any pistols.^" he asked again. 
" No." " Then come down from that fence and tell 
me who you are. Did you come from Cahaba.f'" By 
this time his companion had come up. I had learned 
the names of many men in one company of provost 
guards ; had memorized the names of the company, 
regimental, brigade, and division commanders, and had 
hoped that, in case of capture, we could pretend to be 
Confederate soldiers, and at least be treated as men 
absent without leave, trusting that we might have a 
little better chance of escaping that way than as pris- 
oners from Cahaba ; and I had begun to tell them 
that tale, when Grimes, in reply to their question as 
to whether we had come from Cahaba, replied in the 



CAPTURED. 145 

affirmative. That put a full and irrevocable quietus 
upon my story. It was probably as well that Grimes 
answered, as our dialect and a careful cross-question- 
ing would have almost certainly betrayed us. Seeing 
that we were unarmed, they came near and demanded 
us to come down from the fence. We told them we 
would as soon as we dared, but that we were fearful 
of the savage dogs beneath us. The men were so ex- 
cited for a short time that they paid no attention to 
our request ; but after telling them again we had no 
intention than doing other than their commands, but 
that we did not wish to be bitten by the brutes, one 
of the men came up and drove them away. The 
savage creatures disliked being cheated of their 
prey, and to silence them it was necessary to use the 
boot and whip without stint. After they had been 
reproved, we descended from the fence, and along 
with our captors started back over the weary way 
that led to the grave of our hopes. 

Hounds trained to track human beings seem to pos- 
sess the intelligence and instinct of fiends. Men who 
have observed them say that from a well-trained pack 
it is almost an impossibility to escape. Touch the limb of 
a twig in your flight, and so keen is their scent that the 
limb is a guide-post for hours after. Pass near a fence, 
dry or moist, and enough of odor from a person will 
attach to it that it shall be like trees blazed by wood- 
men. Ford the stream, they will follow and take up 



1 46 CAHABA. 

your track again on the other side. Enter the running 
current and travel in its bed for a mile, the pack will 
divide in four parties, two upon the farther and two 
upon the nearer shore ; one of each will pass up and 
down the bank, and when the trail is again found, with 
their ringing bark the other parties will be recalled, 
and all will unite to chase fugitives ; and cunning in- 
deed must be the wretched black or white who would 
escape from them by stratagem. A mile or two back 
we stopped at the house of a planter to get a drink, 
and as we were so fatigued from our hardships and 
hunger, we ventured to ask for some food. We had 
really eaten but one small meal in forty-eight hours. 
The food sent out — stewed " nigger peas " and cold 
corn bread — was to us most palatable, and after resting 
for half an hour, we were much refreshed and started 
back with our three captors, a third person having 
come up after we had started back. All were well 
armed and mounted. One was chief spokesman ; the 
names of two were Morgan and Hatcher — the third 
one's name I do not remember. Hatcher was quite 
talkative, and as foolish and insane as regards the 
powers of the people of the South as any old dunce 
one could meet in a day's ride. He told us the oft- 
repeated story that soldiers of the North were not as 
valiant as those of the South ; that we could never — no, 
never — conquer the South ; that one Southern man was 
more than a match for two Northern men ; that the 



A BOASTFUL CONFEDERATE. 147 

South had a great advantage by being on the defen- 
sive, and by knowing the country so well ; that no 
people like those of the South had ever been defeated 
when they attempted to gain their liberty. " Why," said 
he, " you can't even begin to ride like our men." Now 
if there was one thing that I could do it was to ride 
well, and so I informed him. " Ah ! but not a Yankee. 
You came from Illinois, and Illinois people are not 
Yankees ; they are like our people. When our inde- 
pendence is acknowledged by the North, Illinois will 
join us ; but the South will never admit into the Con- 
federacy another Northern State ; Ohio is as bad as 
Massachusetts." I took considerable delight in reply- 
ing that I could ride a horse as well as he, and that so 
far as my not being a Yankee was concerned, I was 
born in New England, and had lived there until less 
than a year before the war began, and that I left Illi- 
nois shortly after the commencement of the war; if I 
was not a Yankee, I did not know who was ; that I had 
seen quite a number of battles, and had never had any 
reason to think the Northern soldiers, whether from 
Massachusetts or Minnesota, were less brave or less 
efficient than those from Alabama or South Carolina ; 
that I had seen battles that he had not ; that if the 
opinion of either of us should receive consideration, 
mine certainly ought to be as well founded as his. I 
noticed that my assertions were not conducive to 
good-humor on his part, so, as a matter of policy, I 



148 CAHABA. 

admitted many of his statements, and fared the better 
therefor. The feeling in the South toward Illinois was 
quite frequently the same as he expressed, and the 
reader will note at a later period a practical illustration 
was given in my treatment. A hatred was often mani- 
fested toward the troops from New England that was 
not shown toward those of the West, especially those 
from Illinois. Many times was I treated with com- 
parative civility when men from Ohio or Massachusetts 
were abused. But above all they did, they hated the 
Union men from the border States of Missouri and 
Kentucky. Six or seven miles from where we were 
captured we stopped for the night, at the plantation of 
Hatcher. There we learned of the black rascal who 
had given information concerning us. He was the 
overseer of the field hands of Hatcher's — the same 
fawning, crawling cur who had met us in the wood by 
the cornfield. He had intended, when he asked us to 
wait while he went for melons for us, to keep us at 
that point until he could inform his master of our 
presence. When we had thanked him for his imputed 
kindness and moved forward, he hastened to the " big 
house" and told Hatcher of his discovery, stating that 
we were Yankees, for we did not speak the dialect of 
Southern men. At once the dogs were taken to the 
place in the woods where we had been last seen, had 
lost some little time before getting on the right trail, 
and followed us to the place of our capture, a distance, 



A HARD FATE. 



149 



they informed us, of six or seven miles. The accursed 
slave was called in, and we were shown to him for 
identification. He grinned and wiggled, that he had 
pleased his master so well; but we hoped beneath his 
black skin was an accusing conscience that should fill 
his days with remorse and his nights with ever-recur- 
ring dreams of tireless hounds, with bloody and froth- 
ing mouths, pursuing him and his children fugitives. 
For his sake it is a pity that slavery does not still exist ; 
but doubtless he was a tyrant to the abject souls under 
his dominion. Before going to sleep we were given a 
fair amount of food and told that a guard would be 
placed over us for the night ; that if we attempted to 
escape it would do us no good, for the attempt would be 
fruitless, and we would fare the worse for it. True, es- 
cape in our condition was almost an impossibility. We 
were sore and stiff in every limb ; our feet were galled 
and blistered. Grimes was barefoot, and the other two 
were nearly so. It was a hard fate to submit to, but 
there was no alternative. When morning came we 
were again fed, and started early on our road to Cahaba. 
The distance was such that it would have taken at least 
all day for us to walk it — perhaps two days, lame and 
sore as we were ; so, as a matter of economy of time, a 
wagon was hitched to a span of brisk mules, and, fol- 
lowed by an armed guard, we left the plantation, wish- 
ing in our hearts that it might meet with the fate of 
Sodom before another month should pass by. Quite 



150 



CAHABA. 



late in the afternoon we were driven into Cahaba, and 
before the provost marshal's office. On dismounting, 
the adjutant, Loader, with whom I had already formed 
some acquaintance, took me to the back part of the 
room, and wanted to know where we escaped, and how. 
I argued with him that it was a prisoner's privilege to 
escape if he could, and was willing to take such des- 
perate chances ; that while I could not object to the 
guard taking all possible precautions against the loss of 
prisoners, they certainly could not expect us to furnish 
evidence detrimental to ourselves. My reasons for 
not giving the information he sought were received 
pleasantly, for Loader was quite an agreeable man to 
deal with, and after a few commonplace remarks all 
were sent to prison. Ah ! that return to Castle Mor- 
gan was not like the return of soldiers to their homes 
in the North at the end of the war. Our old comrades 
met us with regret that we should have been recap- 
tured, and by the guards we were marked as half 
criminals, who should be guarded with vigilance, and 
whose acts of insubordination in the future should be 
summarily dealt with. Here my Illinois home saved 
me from a punishment that was meted out to the 
others. Grimes, the hated M issourian, deemed a traitor 
to his State, was taken out the next day and ironed. 
Two links, each about one foot long, united by a short 
link, and at their outer extremity attached to thick iron 
bands for encircling the ankles, were riveted about his 



PUNISHMENT OF RECAPTURED PRISONERS. 151 

limbs. During the process of riveting he was com- 
pelled to stand upon an anvil. The workmanship was 
coarse and rough, and poor Grimes's ankles were soon 
galled to the bone. Gere's crime was less. He was 
not a Missourian, but the prison officials had learned 
that he had been an Ohioan. He was compelled to 
do some work, and for a specified time was sentenced 
to stand on one foot, the other foot raised and placed 
on a slender stick of pine. Fortunate I was from 
Illinois, the only State in the North that boasting, gar- 
rulous old Hatcher would have been glad to receive 
into his dear Confederacy. No sentence was pro- 
nounced against me, though I was never to pass out- 
side the gate, as many did, to gather wood ; and when- 
ever I entered the water-closet was narrowly watched 
by the guard on duty there. From our comrades who 
had watched our escape we learned the story of its dis- 
covery. The guard at the water-closet was held in 
conversation as long as possible, and the trade at length 
completed, when he resumed his duties. His eyes soon 
noted that the opening through which we crawled pre- 
sented a different appearance. The edges of the open- 
ing, instead of being sharp, had been rounded by our 
bodies dragged over them. He observed this change 
carefully for a time, then called the officers of the guard. 
The question was still in doubt, but was settled by call- 
ing the roll of prisoners, when three were found miss- 
ing — the commissary and two men from our company. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

CASTLE MORGAN UNKNOWN REASONS FOR ITS RETIRED 

POSITION IN HISTORY AND TRADITION IN MANY 

PARTICULARS THE WORST PRISON IN THE CONFED- 
ERACY COMPARED WITH ANDERSONVILLE. 

OUR Stay in Castle Morgan, previous to our escape, 
had been so brief that but a slight acquaint- 
ance was formed with other inmates, with guards, 
officers, and the details and environments of the place. 
On entering a second time we were aware that the 
one weak place in the whole prison by which we had 
escaped was thoroughly strengthened — that the possi- 
bility of freedom through that avenue was forever 
gone ; and the future held out no hope of release save 
with the termination of the war. Incidentally, we 
mention here that, after our escape, there is no reliable 
record of the escape of any man from Cahaba except 
one ; and he, after several days, was recaptured. It was 
the most strongly guarded place of confinement in the 
South. It is proper here to give a general considera- 
tion to the position that Castle Morgan should occupy 
in the history of the Rebellion before entering into 



CASTLE MORGAN ALMOST UNKNOWN. I 53 

its details. As a depot for Federal prisoners, Castle 
Morgan is almost unknown to history and in tradition. 
This statement is surprising, when one becomes aware 
that it was one of the large prisons of the South (it 
contained two and one half times as many prisoners as 
Libby) ; that it was by far the most crowded prison 
of the Confederacy ; that while its inmates endured 
nearly all the rigors of other prisons, in some of its 
particulars their hardships and sufferings far exceeded 
those known in any prison. North or South; that half 
of those confined there during the winter of 1864-65, 
as a result of being compelled to stand knee-deep 
in cold water for nearly forty-eight hours, contracted 
serious illness ; and connected with its memory the 
crowning horror, to all that had preceded, one third 
of all those paroled there from just before the close 
of the war lost their lives in an hour. There are 
several reasons for this non-acquaintance by the public 
with the place under consideration. First, because it 
became a large prison late in the war. Minor engage- 
ments in 1 86 1 have ever held a more prominent place 
in history and in the memory of our people than 
battles of much greater magnitude in 1864. There 
were hundreds of men killed in 1863 and 1864 who 
were men of more ability and more local prominence 
than Ellsworth, yet the name of the colonel who died 
in Alexandria in 1861 will be handed down in history, 
and is known to all the men of his time, while the 



154 CAHABA. 

men we suggest, who lost their lives in 1864, were un- 
known beyond their own circle of acquaintances, and 
their names will never be known beyond the present 
generation. The name of Libby Prison became famil- 
iar over the English-speaking world in 1861, and has 
continued so since ; yet had it never been used as a 
place of confinement until 1864, it would have been a 
stranger in the history of the Rebellion. The first 
impressions upon our sense of taste or smell or sight 
are strongest, and impressions of the same character, 
oft repeated, become almost imperceptible. This law 
holds true with impressions upon our memory and ob- 
servation, and this fact explains in part the lack of 
prominence attaching to the name of Cahaba. An- 
other reason for the retired position in history of this 
place is, that no attempt was ever made by our forces 
(on account of its inaccessible position) to release its 
inmates. Such attempts were made for the release of 
the men confined at Richmond and Andersonville 
and Macon, and other places. Stoneman's raid in 
Georgia was inaugurated largely for such a purpose, 
and Dahlgren lost his valued life in a similar attempt. 
Another reason was the small number of men that 
survived the experiences of Cahaba more than a 
few months after the war. Comparing Cahaba with 
Andersonville, one of the best-known prisons in 
the South, we note that Andersonville contained 
during the fall of 1864 over thirty thousand inmates, 



FALSE IMPRESSIONS. I 55 

Cahaba three thousand ; so the experiences of ten men 
are given from the former place to one from the 
latter, if equal percentages of each had survived. 

But a very much larger percentage of those who 
left Cahaba died within the Union lines than of 
those who left the great Georgia pen. These are 
some of the reasons that a public well versed in 
the general history of the Civil War is unacquainted 
with the Alabama place of confinement, and why 
some who learned of the existence of such a place 
formed an estimate of it so incorrect. A few persons 
to whom the name of Castle Morgan was not en- 
tirely unknown had obtained the impression, from 
having heard so little in regard to it, that the place 
was one fairly desirable in which to be confined — at 
least was preferable to the dangers incident to soldier 
life at the front. Soon after the war closed. Congress 
appointed a commission to investigate the treatment 
of prisoners in the different prisons of the South ; and 
among the statements made to this committee, I 
noticed the opinion of one, that this prison was a 
fairly respectable place. A very mild reply to that 
assertion would be, that such an opinion was at vari- 
ance with the express sentiment of all who had been 
confined there for any length of time, especially 
during the last few months of its use as a place 
of confinement. If a canvass were made of the opin- 
ions of those who regard themselves as fairly informed 



156 CAHABA. 

upon the subject of Confederate prisons, I doubt not 
a large majority would decide that Camp Sumter, at 
Andersonville, Ga., was, in their opinion, and in popu- 
lar estimation, the worst prison in the South, and, 
following closely after that, in unpleasant memory, 
would come Libby, Belle Isle, Florence, Millen, and 
Salisbury. Cahaba might not be remembered, or, if 
assigned a place in the hated list, would, perhaps, be 
accompanied by a note stating, " this place was an 
exception to the usual rule regarding prisons." Tak- 
ing Andersonville as the reputed worst example of its 
class, we can by comparison convey a more just idea 
of Castle Morgan. More of misery could be seen in 
a visit to Andersonville than to its Alabama com- 
panion, because the first prison contained ten times 
more inmates, and because many of those who were 
confined in Andersonville had been captives for a 
much longer time than the oldest prisoners at Cahaba. 
Yet I make no assertion exceeding the bounds of 
reason in stating that if Castle Morgan had been 
continued as a military prison, unchanged from its 
status through the zuinter of 1864-5, for a period of 
six months longer, the percentage of its death-rate 
would have far exceeded every other prison in the 
South, and could only have found an historical ana- 
logue in the " Black Hole" of Calcutta. In Ander- 
sonville, if a prisoner were so fortunate as to obtain 
possession of an axe, he was allowed to retain it and 



SEVERE DISCIPLINE. I 57 

use it. In Cahaba, to possess^ an axe was a penal 
crime, and any man upon whom such a crime was 
fastened suffered severely for his temerity. The only 
reason I ever heard given for our not having axes 
supplied to us, was that they could be made, in case 
of an insurrection, an instrument of offence and de- 
fence. The same reasoning would have debarred us 
the use of skillet or wood. I never happened to be 
an eye-witness to the punishment inflicted upon a 
prisoner for having in his possession an axe, but was 
told that the punishment consisted in being put upon 
the " ladder," a means of discipline adopted by the 
Confederates, which is described elsewhere. In An- 
dersonville prisoners were permitted to dig holes in 
the ground, and if they could obtain anything to 
cover their holes, had some shelter from the rain and 
at night when sleeping. A portion of the sleeping- 
ground at Castle Morgan was covered with a leaky 
roof, but a large space was open, and while those who 
lived and slept beneath the old roof were poorly 
protected, certain it is that those who slept in that 
part of the yard covered only by the sky were not 
allowed to dig " dugouts." But if they had been 
allowed to do so, there was no possible way by which 
they could have covered them. For a long time 
I slept where every rain soaked the ground, and 
where it was best often to sit up during a rain than to 
lie down. A smaller amount of rain falls upon a man 



158 CAHABA. 

sitting than when extended at full length upon the 
earth. At Andersonville, men could sleep upon the 
ground where during the day the little mess lire had 
been built, and to which it had imparted a little of its 
genial warmth. To be sure the spot was small, and 
only a small portion of one person could be warmed 
by it, but, small as this boon was, its benefits were un- 
known to the hapless inmates of Cahaba. At Castle 
Morgan all fires were built in the cook-yard, and 
at sundown every prisoner passed through the gate 
into the sleeping-yard, where no fire was ever per- 
mitted after April, 1864. At Andersonville, while the 
water of the creek was wretched, during the summer 
of 1864 a miraculous spring burst forth from the hill- 
side within the prison, and thereafter an abundance of 
sweet pure water was supplied to all. At Castle 
Morgan the water that came into the prison was 
warm and sulphurous and nauseating, and if the 
statement of the Confederate surgeon, R. M. Whit- 
field, who was in charge of the prison, be given any 
credence, the sulphurous taste served only as a dis- 
guise to more unwholesome and more nauseating im- 
purities. Not only at Andersonville, but at every 
other prison in the South, a larger space was allowed 
to each man than was given at Cahaba. A reference 
to the relative amount of space furnished to captives 
in several different prisons of the South reveals the fol- 
lowing facts, which, for the purpose of giving a clearer 



A comparison: 159 

idea of their crowded condition, we compare with 
the space allotted to United States soldiers, by the 
"Army Regulations." In the United States Army 
Regulations it is ordered that in posts located south of 
the thirty-eighth degree of north latitude, each regi- 
mental mess of six men shall be allowed two hundred 
and lifty-six square feet of space, thus giving to each 
man an area of five and a quarter by eight feet, or 
forty-two square feet. This is simply for sleeping, 
storage of clothing, bedding and arms, the soldier 
taking exercise in the open air. Army experience 
and skilled medical advice both determine that this 
amount of space is absolutely needed for men in 
quarters. Andersonville, when most densely crowded, 
had a gross area of a little more than thirty acres. 
Deduct from this the creek and swampy lands on 
either side of it, and a dead line around the whole 
prison, and twenty-three acres remain. The largest 
number of prisoners any one day was on August 8th, 
1864, when the whole number was thirty -three thou- 
sand one hundred and fourteen. This would give to 
each man a little more than thirty square feet of 
surface. At Florence fifteen acres were allotted to 
fifteen thousand men, which would give to each 
about forty-two square feet. Salisbury confined ten 
thousand men upon five acres, giving twenty-one 
square feet to each man. The well-known Libby 
Prison held twelve hundred men upon twenty-four 



l6o CAHABA. 

thousand square feet of floor ; this permitted each 
man twenty square feet of floor. Castle Morgan, 
measured outside of the brick wall, was one hundred 
and sixteen feet by one hundred and ninety-three feet. 
Deducting the thickness of the wall, one foot on each 
side, the " dead line," five feet wide all around the 
inside of the prison, the commissary or guard-room, 
the inner brick wall, and the watercourse, would 
leave a net area of about one hundred and ten by one 
hundred and sixty-four feet, or six square feet per man 
for each of the three thousand men. The following 
tabular statement places the above facts in a more 
condensed form : 

Space allotted one man. 

U. S. Army posts south of 38° N. Lat 42 sq. ft. 

Andersonville 30 " " 

Salisbury 21" " 

Libby Prison 20 " " 

Castle Morgan 6 " " 

Castle Morgan, then, not including its cook-yard, 
gave to each occupant one fifth of the space allotted 
to each prisoner at Andersonville, and including the 
cook-yard, from which all prisoners were excluded one 
half of each twenty-four hours, allowed to each man less 
than one third of the space allotted to men at Camp 
Sumter, and one seventh of the space deemed necessary 
and prescribed by the United States Army Regulations. 
The estimates of the different prisons named above are 
taken from the official report to the House of Repre- 



CROWDED CONDITION OF CASTLE MORGAN. l6l 

sentatives by their committee, and confirmed by the 
personal narratives of several individuals who had care- 
fully measured the several places named while confined 
in them. And my authority for the exact number of 
prisoners confined at Cahaba is the statement of an 
ex-Confederate officer, a part of whose duty it was to 
know positively the number of Federal prisoners there 
confined during 1864 and 1865. Had every man con- 
fined in Castle Morgan been buried within its walls, 
the major portion must have been packed as closely as 
possible, lying upon their sides, to have avoided placing 
one layer above another. It is a matter of doubt whether 
any large prison in the civilized world, during the 
present century, was ever so crowded. The men who 
were in Camp Sumter had the same experience dur- 
ing the last ten days of their confinement that they 
had been accustomed to during the months immedi- 
ately preceding. The men who went forth from Castle 
Morgan had, during their last ten days of confinement 
there, an experience far eclipsing the most rigorous 
hardships they had known before. For two days a 
majority stood knee-deep in cold water, and during a 
portion of that time had only raw meal and raw bacon 
for food. For eight days longer they lived over a cold 
lake, drank such water as should be found only in 
closed sewers, had food that kept fitting company with 
the drink, and when at last they left the prison they 
were stripped of all the quilts in their possession, and 



1 62 CAN ABA. 

when possible they were deprived of their blankets. 
Many men whose capital of vitality was so great that 
they could pass the preceding months in comparative 
health, broke down completely under this last unheard- 
of ordeal, and only reached the hospitals of Vicksburg 
and Jefferson barracks to be soon carried forth stark 
and stiff upon the dead man's stretcher. 



CHAPTER XV. 

LOSS OF THE SULTANA A MAJOR PORTION OF HER 

PASSENGERS FROM CASTLE MORGAN ONLY FOUR 

GREAT BATTLES IN WHICH THE UNION LOSS IN 
KILLED WAS GREATER PERSONAL NARRATIVES. 

BUT a still greater horror was in store for the ill- 
fated inmates of Cahaba. Lashed to the levee 
of Vicksburg was the strong and capacious steamer 
Sultana. Her decks were covered with cots and beds 
for the ghastly skeletons called " paroled prisoners." 
Wherever it was possible to stow away a human be- 
ing within her capacious guards, men who had fought 
starvation and cold, hunger and heat — men who had 
fought vermin and filth, despondency and death, were 
crowded in. A large per cent of her living freight 
were the former captives of Castle Morgan. With her 
decks, above and below, crowded to discomfort, with 
weak-bodied, pinched, and sallow-faced men, the Sul- 
tana steamed up the broad Mississippi. Every league 
of progress brought hope to her passengers : visions 
of a gray-haired mother whose heart has been bursting 
to know the fate of her boy ; visions of a sister into 



164 C AH ABA. 

whose eyes tears welled up at the mention of his 
name, came to the men and gave to them a new life. 
Memphis is reached ; here a large amount of fuel is 
taken on and the boat goes steaming Northward. Night 
settles down upon them, and when all but those to 
whom is given the care of the boat, and those to whom 
pain denies the boon of sleep, are lost in unconscious- 
ness, a great flash lights up the darkness, and, mid 
crash and roar, mid falling: timbers and mang-led com- 
rades, hundreds are thrown into the dark waters. The 
boiler has exploded, the boat is on fire, and no help is 
at hand. 

In the long list embracing every engagement of 
the Rebellion, the Union killed on the field have ex- 
ceeded the loss of lives by this explosion in only 
four great battles : the Wilderness, Gettysburg, Spott- 
sylvania and Antietam. There have been more lives 
lost by this explosion than were killed from the Union 
ranks in the combined battles of Fredericksburg, 
Franklin, and Five Forks ; more than were killed from 
the Union ranks on the fields of battle at Pea Ridge, 
Perry ville, and Pleasant Hill combined ; more than 
the Union loss in killed at Chancellorsville, or Chicka- 
mauga, or Shiloh. Only the fact that it occurred 
just at the close of the great war, just when the 
country was bowed in grief at the murder of its be- 
loved first citizen, gave it relatively a minor place 
in the history of that time. 



A WAR EPISODE. 1 65 

Of the hundreds whose names were upon her Hst, 
over three fourths were lost. No one knows the cause 
of the explosion. Strong partisans charge that a pow- 
erful explosive was placed in the fuel taken on at 
Memphis by Confederate agents — no one knows;* 
but by that explosion one third of all the captives 
who, during the previous winter, were confined at Ca- 
haba have been blotted from existence. The ex- 
prisoners, passengers upon the Sultana, were composed 
of soldiers, a part of whom had been confined at An- 
dersonville, a part at Cahaba. The relative proportion 
of each cannot be definitely stated, but an extensive 



* Since the above was written the Associated Press has published the 

following : 

A WAR EPISODE. 

A RAY OF LIGHT ON A TERRIBLE EXPLOSION ON THE STEAMER SULTANA. 

St. Louis, Mo., May 7, iSS8.^ — The awful explosion on the steamer Sul- 
tana, near Memphis, twenty-three years ago, in which nearly two thousand 
Union soldiers lost their lives, has always been a mystery. The survivors at 
their reunion have recently made a number of statements regarding the 
affair, but the most sensational story has been told by a resident of this 
city, William Streeter. 

This statement fixes the explosion as a result of design. He claims that 
the noted Confederate blockade-runner and mail-carrier named Robert Low- 
den, better known during the war as Charles Dale, was the author of the 
terrible disaster. Streeter claims that Lowden told him after the close of 
the war that while the Sultana lay at Memphis wharf he smuggled aboard a 
large lump of coal in which was concealed a torpedo. 

This he deposited on the fuel pile in front of the boiler for the express 
purpose of causing the destruction of the boat. What has become of Low- 
den is unknown. 



1 66 CAHABA. 

inquiry, and a careful estimate tiierefrom, seems to 
show those from Cahaba to have been a majority. To 
the history of Cahaba, with its relatively small num- 
ber of inmates, the destruction of the doomed boat 
was of much imore importance than to the history of 
Andersonville, and any narrative of Cahaba that omit- 
ted the story of the wreck would be incomplete. To 
paint a more vivid picture of the disaster, I shall quote 
in their own lang^uao^e the remembrances of several 

CM O \ 

comrades. 

The Sultana arrived at Vicksburg from New Or- 
leans, with passengers and crew numbering a little 
over one hundred. There she took on board two 
thousand and thirty-one Union ex-prisoners, a few 
soldiers for guards, some Christian Commission men, 
and a small squad of ex-Confederate soldiers going 
to their homes in Arkansas and Tennessee. At 
Memphis she took on board a supply of fuel, and 
started North at a little past midnight of April 27th, 
1865. She had gone but a few miles when her 
boiler or something in her furnace exploded, blow- 
ing a large number into the river, scalding, crush- 
ing, and burning many more. In a few minutes she 
was on fire, slowly burned to the water's edge, then 
sank upon the Arkansas side of the Mississippi, three 
or four miles above Memphis. Of the twenty-two hun- 
dred on board at the time of the disaster, fourteen 
hundred and forty-three were lost at once, and of the 



THE SULTANA DISASTER. 1 67 

seven hundred and fifty-seven rescued, nearly three 
hundred died in the hospitals at Memphis in the fol- 
lowing twenty days. So that a careful estimate places 
the loss of life caused by the explosion at about sev- 
enteen hundred and fifty, the greatest loss of life from 
a marine disaster that ever occurred upon the Western 
Hemisphere. 

The first quotation was the experience of W. A. 
Fast, now an attorney residing at Sedalia, Mo. : " Much 
of my reminiscence of the Sultana disaster must be my 
own part in the affair, for each one was too busy sav- 
ing himself to give much time or thought to his 
neighbors. I was sleeping on the top or hurricane 
deck, and within a few feet of the rear end. With me 
were five chums from my own town, Orange, Ash- 
land County, O. Our heads were resting on the slop- 
ing side of a metallic life-boat when the steamer blew 
up. I feel a jerk and jar, some hot water falls on my 
face and hands, and I wake, and seemed among the 
first on foot in that quarter. In a moment all were 
on their feet and seemingly aware of what had hap- 
pened. In a minute or two it seemed that a hundred 
men were tugging at the boat. It was thrown over- 
board, and after it, making a plunge of perhaps twen- 
ty feet into the dark water, went from a hundred to a 
hundred and fifty men. My chums followed that 
boat and lost their lives — at least I never saw or 
heard of them afterward. I deemed it safer for a 



1 68 CAHABA. 

time to remain on the Sultana than to take my 
chances with a hundred men fighting for a httle boat. 
I went forward at once. She was a side-wheeler, and 
one wheel-house was gone and the other shattered and 
hanging out from the centre of the boat. The front 
part of the boat was blown, nobody knows where, and 
with it, I doubt not, five hundred men. Fire at once 
started and came up through the pilot-house, the lat- 
ter seeming to act as a flue or smoke-stack. I jump- 
ed down on to the second or middle floor, or deck, 
and went into the state-rooms to find a life-preserver. 
There was no person in the rooms and I found no 
life-preservers, so I came out and went forward to 
where the floor was broken off. The men were rush- 
ing out from the lower floor or deck, and pouring over 
the prow into the dark water like a flock of sheep 
through a gap in a fence. After a time I broke a 
door from a state-room, went forward to the edge of 
the floor as torn off by the explosive, and, after watch- 
ing the progress of events a few minutes, threw my 
door down on to the mass of debris which covered 
the lower floor or deck, and jumped down on to it. 
After the most of the men had left the boat, I took 
the door, made my way forward to the prow of the boat, 
pulled down fifteen or twenty feet of rope from the 
jack-staff and tied it to the door? leaving several loops 
to catch on to in order to hold the door w^hen in the 
water. A few big, burly deck hands were still on 



THE EXCITEMENT ON BOATED. 1 69 

board, flying hither and thither, crazed with excite- 
ment. Once or twice they seized my door and tried 
to wrench it from my grasp, for it was the best buoy 
then in sight. To save it I walked back to where the 
stairway went up to the second deck, wedged it in be- 
tween some timbers, took out a small jack-knife and 
stood to defend my possession. By this time the 
boat was wrapped in flames and lighted up the river 
for miles. I could see men in all directions strug- 
gling, swimming, sinking. My plan was to stick to the 
boat as long as I could and until the swimmers were 
well out of my way. Now, a word about what I saw 
preceding this, while standing on the upper deck. 
I saw many men standing on the debris and on the 
edge of the boat, just ready for the final leap, indulg- 
ing their vocal and oratorical powers in a great 
variety of ways. Some were praying, some singing, 
and some swearing a ' blue streak.' Some would 
curse Abe Lincoln, Jeff" Davis, General Grant — any and 
everybody prominently connected with the war. Some 
were crying like children. Some muttered curses on 
everything in heaven above or on the earth below. 
Some prayed very loud, and most passionately ; others 
were getting off" very formal and graceful prayers — all 
in dead earnest. Now and then a very calm indi- 
vidual met my gaze, but I didn't see a soldier calmly 
sit down and light his pipe. It was said that the 
steamer blew up at one o'clock a.m. At half-past 



I 70 CAR ABA. 

two it was becoming so hot that I could not stay 
longer on the boat unless I climbed down into the 
hold. Some few did that. I did not like that idea. 
I then had on nothing but my shirt and drawers. A 
small, open-faced watch was tied to my drawers and 
was tucked inside the waistband. As I stood on the 
prow, my door in readiness, I pulled out the watch ; 
it was then half-past two. I threw my door into 
the water, jumped in after it, and was soon afloat. 
Hardly had I got righted when a comrade appeared 
and took hold of my door, then another and another, 
and soon half a dozen of us were struggling for that 
door. I was the strongest at first, and wrenched one 
hand after another from it, but too many came. Soon 
I became exhausted, and within twenty minutes I 
was nearly drowned two or three times. I lost my 
door, and with my door went for a time, it seems, my 
power of memory. From the time I lost that door 
until daylight there is in my life an entire blank. I 
do not know where I was or what I was doing. 
About daylight I found myself hanging to some very 
small bushes, and water so deep beneath me that I 
could not touch bottom. Looking about me, I 
noticed that there was as much as from forty to sixty 
acres of water surface covered with small bushes and 
twigs, and these were but the tops of small cotton- 
wood and willow trees, whose roots were from ten to 
twenty feet below the surface of the water. At the 



THE WRECK. I "J I 

foot of this island, and about a quarter of a mile down 
the river, I saw the hull of the vessel, the upper decks 
all burned ofif, slowly turning round and round in an 
eddy. I made my way from bush to bush down to it. 
On it were several men. I tried to climb upon it, 
and only succeeded in doing so after, perhaps, one 
hour's effort and almost complete exhaustion, narrow- 
ly escaping death by drowning two other times by 
falling back into the water after getting nearly on the 
boat. The only way of making our way from the 
water to the top of the hull — for there were several of 
us trying the feat — was by a rope and a chain let down 
by the boys already on the craft. It was about sun- 
rise, I think, w^hen I made my first trial, and perhaps 
half-past seven when I got on the boat. This rem- 
nant of the boat was then about three fourths of a mile 
from the Arkansas shore, and from two to four miles 
from the Tennessee shore, and I think about five 
miles from Memphis. On the remnant of the boat 
was from two to three feet of debris — coal, wood, etc. — 
all afire and alive with intense heat, save and except 
about twenty feet of the floor nearest the prow. 
Here lay, I should think, two or three wagon-loads of 
cast-ofT clothing, blankets, etc. When I got on the 
boat there was about twenty-five persons on it, about 
twenty of whom were able-bodied, the balance scalded 
or maimed. We pulled up out of the water about 
twelve more, making in all thirty-seven, I think, who 



1 72 CAHABA. 

linked their fortunes, for the time, to the burning 
boat in its last struggle. Soon after I got on the 
boat, I recognized, floating along on a piece of siding 
about ten feet long. Sergeant Owens, of Sandusky, O., 
one of the men who had escaped from Cahaba prison 
and was hunted down with blood-hounds and brought 
back. I threw Owens a small rope. I tied to this a 
big rope, and Owens pulled up to the island of brush, 
hauled the big, rope out, and tied it to the limb of a 
fallen tree. Thus we tied up the hull, and here she 
burned till she sank. And here we, the thirty-seven, 
less the wounded, fought the fire till relief came about 
eight or nine o'clock. We got off" in this way: 
About eight o'clock we saw a man put off from the 
Arkansas shore with two hewn logs lashed together. 
The logs were about one foot square and ten or 
twelve feet long. He came within about six rods of 
us and our burning boat, and then stopped for a par- 
ley. He said that he could carry only six of us, and 
if more ofot on we would all drown. He was afraid 
to come nearer lest all should leap overboard and get 
on to his logs. The crisis was getting desperate. 
Finally, a comrade, whom I called all the morning 
' Indiana,' and myself stepped to the edge of the burn- 
ing hull, and declared in the most solemn manner 
that if he would approach we would not get on his 
logs, and would not permit over six persons to get on. 
He approached, six got on, he took them about half- 



A PERILOUS SITUATION. I 73 

way to the Arkansas shore, and they climbed some 
trees, the branches of which was above the water, 
most of their trunks beneath. He came and went 
several times, always taking six, and leaving them in 
the tree-tops. Finally, he said, the men were too 
much exhausted, and it took too long to climb a tree, 
so he began taking the remainder to shore, the men 
always paddling with their hands and feet so as to 
speed the trip. All this took time, and more desper- 
ate became the chances of those of us still on the 
burning hull. After a while the floor, though saturat- 
ed with water and withstanding the fire a long time, 
burned through at a place near the rear. Then the 
flames swept clean through under us and up through 
the large hole near the prow, which operated like a 
chimney. So it was fire on both sides and under our 
feet. We feared our fate must be death by burning, 
yet we hung blankets and blouses about us, dipped up 
water with our quart coffee-cups, with ropes attached, 
and poured over our heads, keeping the clothing and 
blankets on us saturated. We fought the fire and 
still hoped to get the last man off before she sank or 
burned completely. Finally, it came to the last thirteen 
men, five of whom were about helpless from wounds 
and scalds. Something seemed to say as the boat left 
the Arkansas shore for the next to the last load that 
that was the last trip, and six or seven must perish. 
' Indiana' and I, and others, hurriedly discussed the sit- 



174 CAHABA. 

uation. Should we strong ones take to the raft and 
leave the helpless ? Human instinct struggling for 
self-preservation seemed to argue yes. But the maim- 
ed ones took in the situation at once, and begged for 
the strong ones not to abandon them. We did not. 
The raft approached ; we, ' Indiana' and myself, put on 
the helpless ; then some one said that seven must go 
that load or the next. I said, ' Seven goes this load,' 
slipped down the cable, straddled a log, and with 
hands and feet helped to pull for the shore. We 
landed, the raft went back, got the other six off 
almost overcome with heat and smoke. The raft had 
got only about six rods from the burning hull 
when it sank, leaving nothing but the jack-staff stick- 
ing above water to mark where she went down. 
There, four days after, when we were on our way up the 
river to Cairo, we saw the jack-staff, a sentinel on duty, 
marking the spot where lay the remains of the Sul- 
tana. About eleven o'clock, a boat, whose mission it 
was to gather survivors, came along, and a little body 
of about fifty gathered together on the Arkansas 
shore, boarded her and proceeded to Memphis. 
Black with smoke, and burned and bruised arid scarred, 
we walked down the gang-plank, and as we stepped 
on shore the ladies of the Sanitary Commission (the 
Lord bless those noble women !) met us, took us aside 
one by one to the brink of the river, washed us, assist- 
ed those of us who still had remnants of clothing on 



SCENES AND INCIDENTS. I 75 

to remove them (many were naked, or supplied only 
with a blanket, worn Indian style), then clothed each 
of us with a red shirt and drawers of the common 
sanitary kind, placed us in an ambulance or other ve- 
hicle, and sent us up-town to a hospital. We prom- 
enaded the streets of Memphis three days in that pic- 
turesque garb, hatless and shoeless. Then Uncle Sam 
came to our relief, hunted us out a full new suit of 
army blue, and soon we were on our way to Cairo 
and Camp Chase. Some incidents and scenes dur- 
ing the morning and day following the catastrophe. 
From daylight till noon one could hear the boys, who 
were scattered up and down the river for a distance, 
it is said, of forty miles, perched upon trees, rocks, 
points of islands, or hanging to the brush and in the 
water, indulging their humor in a great variety of 
ways. Some were singing old and familiar army 
songs and patriotic airs ; some negro melodies ; some 
mocking the birds ; some sitting upon the rocks, and 
conscious of their ridiculous plight, raised a laugh 
among their companions by mimicking frogs — in fact, 
every living thing that raised its voice above the 
sound of the waters — for the Mississippi 'was on a 
tear ' — was quite sure to find an imitator of the sound 
it -made. The most pitiable scene I witnessed was 
that of a lad hemmed in by fire and water and hang- 
ing to the burning boat. Under the guard of the 
boat and attached to it were large iron rings, and at 



1 76 CAHABA. 

a point about midway along the right-hand side of 
the vessel, the lad lay on the water under the boat's 
guards, holding to one of these rings, or, rather, to 
something attached to the rings. Over him the top 
of the guards was on fire, and on both sides of him 
was fire for a distance of many feet, perhaps twenty 
feet. He, of course, realized to the full extent his 
peril, and as the fire slowly approached from the sides 
he begged most piteously for us to save him. We 
could easily hear all he said — indeed, could not help 
hearing it. Sometimes he would pray, then shout for 
help, then would cry and beg and coax, in the most 
heartrending manner. He said that he had a mother 
in Indiana, and that she was well off, and if we would 
save him she would give us all that she was worth. 
Every inducement his mind could suggest to move 
us to save him was expressed. For an hour or two 
he held to his ring, the fire still creeping closer and 
closer, as it made its way through the water-soaked 
timber. We could do nothing for him ; a wall of fire 
surrounded him. We floated him some ropes, but 
the fire would burn them otf before he could clutch 
them. Of timber or boards we had none, except one 
large pole ; we threw that off, but he failed to grasp it, 
as, doubtless, he was unable to swim. Finally, as the 
fire crept closer and closer to him, and he breathed 
the hot air and smoke, his voice grew hoarse and 
more feeble. He talked more and more of his home 



HEART-RENDING SCENES. I 77 

and mother in Indiana, until at last his hold relaxed, 
and he sank into the friendly waters beneath him. 
His last audible words were of home and his 
mother. Poor boy ! I shall never forget him and 
his piteous appeal. It was the most heartrending of 
all the sad scenes of nearly three years of my army 
and prison life." 

The following was written by M. C. White, now of 
Hartford, Mich. : " I lay asleep on the hurricane deck, 
aft of the wheel-house, on the Arkansas side, and was 
not hurt by the explosion. I first thought that a 
rebel battery had fired on us, and a shell had ex- 
ploded on board. Officers gave orders to remain 
quiet, for the boat was going ashore ; but little atten- 
tion was paid to these orders, as it was soon evident 
that every one must look out for himself, as the boat 
immediately took fire. Most of the boys stripped off 
their clothes and jumped into the river, which was 
cold and swift, and some three or four miles wide, and 
so dark that you could not see the shore. The scenes 
were heart-rending ; the wounded and dying begging 
for help — some praying, and some swearing — while 
those in the water would catch hold of one another, 
and go down in squads. The fire was getting so hot 
that I soon saw that I must get into the water. I 
was quite an expert swimmer, and thought if I could 
get av/ay from the crowd I might save myself, though 

I was quite weak, having been sick a good deal of the 
12 



I yS CAHABA. 

time I was in prison. I went to the gangway to go 
below, but found that it was gone, so I jumped down 
on the lower deck. What a sight — men dead and 
dying, parts of bodies, arms, legs, and the wreck of the 
boat, all in one mingled mass ! As I stopped to take 
one hurried glance around, I heard some one near me 
exclaim, ' For God's sake, some one help me get this 
man out !' I turned, and saw that it was a lieutenant 
of a Kentucky regiment. He was a very large man, 
and w^as called * Big Kentuck.' He had found a man 
that was fast by both feet, a large piece of the wreck 
having fallen across them as he lay asleep. I took 
hold and helped the lieutenant, but we could not get 
him out, and no doubt he roasted alive, for the fire 
was then getting very hot. I then went to the edge 
of the boat, took off my shoes, pulled down my cap, 
and plunged in with my clothes on. I thought I 
would be better off with them on, as they would keep 
me warmer. I was very fortunate in making my way 
through the crowd without any catching hold of me, 
and also in finding a plank ; but I did not go far with 
it before a comrade grabbed it that was about half 
drowned, and apparently crazy. The plank would 
have answered for us both if he had stayed at one 
end. I tried to reason with him, but he, hearing my 
voice, would keep coming for me, grabbing and yell- 
ing. Once he got almost in reach of me, and I was 
afraid to have him get hold of my clothes for fear he 



"MANY CHILLED TO DEATHS I yg 

would drown us both, so I left him with the plank, 
and struck out without any support. It was very 
dark, and all I could see was the burning steamer. I 
could not tell which way to go to make land, so I 
floated on the water and let the current take me. 
When it came daylight, I was going around a bend in 
the river, and the current took me near the shore. I 
could see trees, but no land, as the river was very high 
and the banks all overflowed. I thought my only 
chance was to get to those trees. I was very cold, 
and nearly exhausted then, and when I got there the 
first tree I came to — the water being up to the 
branches — I threw my arm over a limb, and had just 
strength enough to hang on. It was some time 
before I could climb up out of the water. I found 
that I had come down the river six miles, and landed 
on the Arkansas side. As it got lighter, I could see 
comrades all around me, some in trees and some on 
drift-wood, and nearly all naked. To make it worse, 
the buffalo gnats were so thick that they nearly ate us 
up. Then I was glad that I kept on my clothes, for 
a good many chilled to death after getting out 
before they were picked up. I was rescued by the 
steamer Silver Spray, after being in my tree about 
three hours. We were treated kindly on the boat. 
Bedclothes were taken from the state-rooms and 
given to the boys to wrap around them. We soon 
landed in Memphis. The excitement was intense. 



l8o CAHABA. 

It seemed that every one in the city was down to 
the wharf, and nearly every hack in the city was in 
charge of a soldier, backed down to the wharf-boat 
ready to take us to the hospital as fast as we were 
ready. As we stepped from the gang-plank into the 
wharf-boat, to greet us were ladies of the Sanitary 
Commission and Sisters of Charity (God bless them), 
who handed to each of us a red flannel shirt and 
drawers. As fast as we donned our red suits we step- 
ped into a carriage and was driven rapidly to the hos- 
pital, where all was done for us that could be to make 
us comfortable. Many died after reaching the hos- 
pital. Out of the twenty-two hundred on board 
the Sultana, fifteen hundred filled an untimely and 
watery grave. There are many touching incidents 
connected with that disaster, but I fear my letter is 
already too long. If this should meet the eye of any 
surviving comrade of that disaster, I should be very 
glad to hear from him." 

Perry Summerville, of the Second Indiana Cavalry, 
has told his experience on this terrible occasion, as fol- 
lows : " My quarters were on the cabin deck, on the 
guard to the left, over and opposite the boilers. We 
got to Memphis on the evening of April 26th. 
There the steamer unloaded a large amount of sugar, 
after which she ran up to the coal-barge, and was tak- 
ing in coal, and that was the last that I knew till I 
found myself in the river. In the explosion I must 



DESPAIR AND CONFUSION. l8l 

have been thrown fully one hundred feet. I sank 
only once. My first thought was that the steamer had 
been running close to shore, and I had been dragged 
off by a limb. I was very much excited for a few 
minutes, and then I struck out for the steamer. I 
had no sooner done so than I saw that something 
was wrong on board. I could see steam and fire, and 
hear screams and groans proceeding from the boat 
and passengers, so I began to swim down stream. 
I had not gone far before the boat .was wrapped in 
flames. The scene that followed beggars descrip- 
tion. Hundreds of passengers suddenly aroused from 
peaceful sleep, bruised or scalded by the explosion, or 
scarcely able to crawl from battle wounds or starva- 
tion in prison, were throwing or dragging themselves 
from the burning boat into the deep, swift river, there, 
many of them, to find watery graves. The utter de- 
spair and confusion of the hour were unfadingly 
wrought on my memory; but I cannot paint the pic- 
ture, and must leave it to the imagination of the 
reader. In swimming down the river I should have 
drowned if I had not fortunately got hold of a rail. I 
could see the timber on either bank, but could not 
make in to shore. About two miles above Memphis 
I succeeded in adding a large plank to my rail, which 
I drew across the front end, holding to the rail with 
my feet, and the plank with my hands. I lay so near 
the surface that I suffered extremely from cold. I 



162 CAHABA. 

was picked up at Memphis, my rescuer being a col- 
ored man, and placed on board a boat. I had been 
two hours in the river, and was so chilled and numb 
that I could not stand. Besides, I had been scalded 
on the back, and bruised on the breast in the explo- 
sion, from the effects of which I spat blood for some 
time. Two miles below the scene of the explosion a 
gun-boat passed us, going up the river. The many 
victims of the explosion that were close to it failed to 
attract attention. At any rate the boat did not stop. 

" A little later on I heard a horse coming down the 
river. When he came close enough, I distinguished 
at least a dozen men clinging to him. I kept clear of 
the horse, or, rather, the men, for fear of losing my rail. 
The poor animal was swimming down stream, but 
whether or not the men who clung to him were ever 
rescued, I have no means of knowing. I was finally 
overtaken by Jerry Parker, of the Second Michigan 
Cavalry, who for quite a distance swam by my side. 
All knew Jerry, who was a great favorite. He was 
astride a barrel, and was as good-humored as ever — at 
least circumstances considered. We would have 
cheered him, his presence so inspired us, but of course 
that was impracticable. We were together quite a 
while, our company getting larger at times as the cur- 
rent bore us down. Jerry told us to be of good cheer, 
saying we would all be rescued. I am glad to say he 
was among the number saved." 



"PINNED DOWN TO THE DECKr 1 83 

George H. Young, formerly of the Ninety-fifth 
Ohio, now a resident of Evans, Col, has given the fol- 
lowins* reminiscence of the occurrence : 

'• I, with S. Muller, of the Thirteenth O. V. L, W. F. 
Clancy, Twentieth O. V. I., and two others, acquaint- 
ances, were sleeping about half-way from the cabin 
to the stairway, and had been asleep three or four 
hours, when we were awakened by the explosion. 
As it was at the time cloudy, threatening rain, and 
an occasional flash of distant lightning was visible, 
I supposed for a moment that the lightning had 
struck the boat, and so exclaimed to my comrades. 
Our squad of five were all pinned down to the deck 
on which we were sleeping by the debris of the 
hurricane deck which had fallen upon us from above. 
The man on my left was killed instantly by a tim- 
ber falling across his body. A soldier on top of 
the roof just over us heard our cries for help, and 
broke away a few pieces of boards over Clancy which 
released him, and in turn he broke away some from 
over me, and soon I, too, was free. Then Clancy and 
myself tried to release Muller, but the timber over 
him was so strong and heavy that we could make but 
little progress before a gust of wind drove the flames 
right in our faces, and we were compelled to retreat 
to the opposite side of the boat. In a few moments 
the flames were driven in another direction by the 
boat turning about ; so we ran back to Muller again 



1 84 CAHABA, 

and made the utmost exertions, but shortly the flames 
returned and drove us away, though it was agonizing 
to Hsten to the beseechings of our comrade while we 
were so helpless. We could not escape from his 
hoarse cries, and, cruel as it seems, we were relieved 
when death ended his horrible agony. Then Clancy 
and I climbed over the stairway and got down to the 
boiler deck. Here Clancy's courage and self-posses- 
sion completely gave way, and he became frantic 
with excitement and fear. We found few sound men 
on the boiler deck, but a large number of injured 
ones. Some of these were trying to get forward, 
crawling along with broken limbs or badly scalded, 
and many implored us for aid, as they could not swim. 
Some, in their agony, crawled to the edge of the boat 
and rolled themselves into the water to drown. The 
fire was raging above the boiler deck when we got 
there, and when the wind changed it would come 
toward us, and we were compelled to get down to let 
it blow over us. Four of us tried to get a large plank 
from the coal bunk, but all our united efforts failed to 
pull it off. Once or twice I stopped Clancy from 
jumping, telling him of the drowning men visible 
in all directions, but at last, when the fire was sweep- 
ing forward, I saw him run to the side of the boat and 
jump off, and that was the last of him to me. When 
the heat became so great that no one could remain on 
the portion of the boat where I was, and as it was im- 



STRUGGLING IN THE WATER. 1 85 

possible to reach any other part of the boat where the 
heat was less, I picked up a rubber blanket, threw it 
upon the surface of the water— there was nothing else 
obtainable — and a moment later leaped from the 
boat. The blanket kept me from going under, 
though the water came to my eyes. As I was steady- 
ing myself, not looking toward the boat, a person 
near me grasped me by the shirt-sleeve. To break 
that hold required a great effort, but, drawing myself 
up, I put my fist in his side, gave a strong, sudden 
push and broke from him, and a moment after freed 
myself from another drowning person who was drag- 
ging me beneath the water. Though not excited, I had 
to exert myself to keep above water and away from 
drowning men, and I was getting tired. Soon I deter- 
mined to take off my drawers as they were full of 
water and were an impediment to swimming. I un- 
loosed them at the waist, and tried, by treading the 
water, to get them off, forgetting that they were fast 
around my ankles. I soon realized that I could not 
get them untied, and they were fast dragging me be- 
neath the river's surface, and only after a long 
and wearisome struggle did I succeed in replacing 
them. By this time my left hand was paining me 
very much, and raising it up to the light of the burning 
boat, I found that my wrist, thumb, and two fingers 
were blistered and badly swollen. When the air 
struck it the pain was greater than when in the water, 



1 86 CAHABA. 

SO I kept it beneath as much as possible. Looking: 
around, I saw a blue object coming toward me, so I 
swam slowly away, fearing it might be a drowning 
man. Watching it longer, I observed no motion, so 
let it come near, when I cautiously touched it. It 
proved to be a pair of pants. These I thought would 
be of service when I got out, so I threw them over 
my left arm. I soon saw another object, which 
proved to be a small piece of the roof. This I got 
under my arm, as I was getting very tired. Still drift- 
ing with the current, barely keeping myself above 
water, I soon picked up half of a cork life-preserver 
and a cracker-box. I was then happy, for I believed 
that I was going to get out somewhere. While look- 
ing about for the place where I could soonest reach 
dry land, I heard a splash close by, and turning my 
head I saw some one trying to swim toward me. As 
he had nothing to buoy him up, I told him not to 
catch hold of me and I would give him my cracker- 
box. A moment after I pushed it toward him and 
swam on, trusting he would get it. I was very watch- 
ful for drowning men, and the least movement made 
me cautious. I was now, as I thought, rounding a point 
of land, and expected to land on the Arkansas side. 
At intervals I heard a halloo. I answered, and was sur- 
prised to hear a reply close by. I called again. The 
answer came, ' How are you fixed .^' I replied, ' All 
right.' Then I asked what he had — if anything. He an- 



A FRIENDLY TREE. 1 8/ 

swered that he was on a log. I called him again to 
come over near me, but in words more forcible than 
refined he declined to do so. Then I urged that we 
could be of mutual assistance in getting into a tree-top. 
This met with his approval enough for him to come 
nearer, but not close enough for me to become a part- 
ner with him in the possession of the log. Soon we 
passed from the swift current into still water, and I 
trusted that the shore must be near by. Looking in 
the darkness off to my right, I saw against the sky a 
tree-top and started for it at once, and, aided by an 
eddy, soon came near it. Just then, when within fif- 
teen or twenty feet of the tree, I was seized with a 
severe cramp in my legs. With one hand almost dis- 
abled previous to this by the injury it had received on 
the boat, it was impossible for me to keep above the 
water, and though struggling frantically, I sank beneath 
the surface for a moment. Doubtless my struggles 
added to my misfortune, for on ceasing to struggle, 
and holding closely to the piece of life-preserver, I 
rose to the surface. The cramp abating, I paddled 
with my uninjured hand up to the tree, and, seizing a 
limb within reach, drew myself from the water. Then 
I called to my unknown companion, who, with his 
log, swam near. Oh, what a sense of security took 
possession of me on being firmly seated upon the 
limb of that tree ! As soon as I was sufficiently 
rested to make any exertion, I gathered up my draw- 



1 88 CAHABA. 

ers and fastened them about my waist, and drew on 
the pants I had picked up in the river. But the chill 
night wind pierced my clothing like needles, and feel- 
ing a benumbing chilliness creeping over me, I 
dropped back into the water, as its temperature was 
higher than that of the air. Who ever prayed for 
* light, more light,' more earnestly than did I and 
my companion there clinging to that tree in the dark- 
ness and cold ! In all directions we could hear the 
sounds of struggling and shouting human beings. 
My attention was at length arrested by a voice com- 
ing from shoreward and nearer than any other. I re- 
plied to the ' Hello,' and immediately a voice asked, 
' Where are you.^*' ' In a tree right here, only a little 
way from you,' I replied. ' Well, cling to the limb 
and come toward me, and you can touch ground with 
your feet.' We joyfully followed his directions, and, as 
he had told us, found our feet touching ground while the 
water was up to our breasts. Our new friend was a citi- 
zen stopping in a camp near by, and when awakened 
by the explosion he hastily dressed himself, jumped 
into his log canoe, and had been exerting himself from 
that time to the present assisting our boys in getting 
to the shore. With his canoe it was difficult for him to 
come to us, through the dense brush, so he directed 
us to come to him, as he believed that to be the most 
speedy way to get to his boat. Following his direc- 
tions we waded toward him, at one place falling com- 



A TIMELY RESCUE. 1 89 

pletely under water, but a few minutes after we were 
— oh, how thankful our hearts, how cheering the 
thought ! — in his canoe. He said we were on an isl- 
and, and he would take us to a cabin near by. Fol- 
lowing us into the boat, with a long pole he pushed 
through the shallow water to the cabin of which he 
had spoken, but by the time we arrived there we were 
so stiff from the cold and long-continued bath that we 
could only get out of the canoe by his assistance. In 
front of the house a platform of logs fastened together 
had been placed evidently by the owner at some pre- 
vious time. Once on this platform we tried to warm 
ourselves by exercising for a few minutes, for we saw 
that there were several persons within, and that the 
fire around which they were hovering was small and 
to them a source of but little comfort. The chill air 
striking our wet clothes, however, drove us to seek 
some shelter, and we passed into the cabin, where we 
found two ladies sitting on a ' trussel,' two soldiers, 
badly scalded and burned, lying on a bed, and two 
others, somewhat injured, lying on the floor. The 
men on the bed were in dreadful agony, and could 
not repress their groans, as the wind would at times 
blow through the cracks between the logs on their 
writhing bodies. One of the ladies w^as scantily 
dressed, and, like all others who had any clothing, hers 
was dripping with w^ater. The little room gave some 
evidence of being used for a shelter, so I looked 



I go CAHABA. 

about hoping to find some cloth of any kind to put 
on my scalded arm. On looking into a barrel I dis- 
covered some flour, and asked if I could have a little 
to cover over my burns. No one seemed to have any 
ownership in the flour, but several of those present 
spoke up at once and urged me to take what I might 
want. I did so, covering the burned parts thickly with 
flour, and in a few minutes my suffering from that 
source was much diminished. Then I went out of 
the cabin on to the logs fastened in front of the door 
and found two or three new arrivals, one of whom 
was a one-armed comrade who was entirely naked, 
poor from a long prison life, and shivering in the 
wind. To him I gave my pair of drawers, and then 
he was willing to go into the cabin into the presence 
of the ladies, from whose sight he had before shrunk. 
The pain in my arm and the cold wind compelled 
me to keep moving backward and forw^ard, sometimes 
running to keep warm, and this 1 continued until day- 
light. From our rescuer we learned of our proximity 
to Memphis, and gathered hope from the information. 
About ten o'clock a small steamer, the Pocahontas, 
landed near where we were and took us on board. 
" On her we found many comrades who had been 
picked up previously, and our number so filled the 
boat that she could rescue no more, and at once started 
down the river to Memphis. We arrived at Memphis 
before noon, and on landing I met comrade Eldridge 



NERVOUS AND RESTLESS. I9I 

of Company A, 95, and Mailbre, who was in charge of 
the Soldiers' Lodge on the river's bank. They gave to 
each of us some clothing ; then I went to the lodge 
and stayed with them for a few days, nursing my 
burned arm and keeping quiet. For many days and 
nights I was so nervous that I could not sleep, and 
when any of the boats were near and puffing, I shook 
as if seized with an ague. Night after night would I 
jump up on hearing any noise, and I had to change my 
sleeping-place from a bunk to a cot, for I had bumped 
my head till it was sore. No one was permitted to 
stay long at the lodge, so comrade Eldridge told me 
to go to a hospital and report, so that my name should 
appear as an inmate, then return and stay with them. 
I reported to Washinger Hospital on Main Street. I 
had such a dread of going on to a boat, that I thought 
best to stay till my nerves got more quiet and my 
hand got well. I was about two weeks in Memphis, 
when my longing for home overcame my fear of the 
boats, and I left one morning on the steamer City of 
Acton, and in good time arrived at home, Columbus, 
O. No words can portray the joy of the restora- 
tion to my family, both to my parents and to myself. 
As a memento of that terrible night I still suffer from 
bronchitis and asthma, which has compelled me to 
reside in Colorado, and, strive as I may, I cannot re- 
press an involuntary fright on hearing in the stillness 
of the night any unusual noise." 



192 CAHABA. 

We conclude the story of the Sultana with the 
reminiscence of J. W. Rush, whose experience with us 
in Castle Morgan is narrated elsewhere in this volume : 

" At the time of the explosion of the steamer Sultana 
I was lying on what is known as the water-box, near 
the wheel-house on the upper deck, in company with 
George W. Steward, now a resident of Wellington, 
Kan. There seemed to be two distinct explosions. 
The first awakened us, and by the time we were on 
our feet, the hot steam was coming up through the 
deck, and immediately another explosion followed. 
Neither of us were hurt. Having been raised on Lake 
Erie, and being familiar with boats, I took in the situa- 
tion at once, and was satisfied that the boilers of the 
steamer had exploded. 

" I started to the rear of the boat, expecting to make 
my escape by jumping overboard before the crowd real- 
ized the peril they were in, for I well knew that it would 
be a difficult matter to escape after the twenty-two 
hundred people that were on board once got aroused 
to the situation, as I felt that nothing could be done to 
allay so great an excitement and confusion as would 
follow. As I reached the stern of the boat I saw a yawl 
launched from the lower deck with four or five persons 
in it, all of whom, I believe, were deck hands. 1 pre- 
sume they were parties who were on watch at that 
time. There was a woman who begged piteously to 
be let into the boat, and from the conversation that 



THE LIFE-BOATS. 1 93 

took place, I think she was the wife of one of them, 
but they realized the situation and got away from the 
boat as quickly as possible and left her. 

" Not being able to get into the yawl. Steward and I 
then turned to and helped launch the life-boats from 
the upper deck, but as soon as a boat struck the water, 
crowds from each deck jumped into it, striking upon 
one another, and the boat was capsized. This was also 
true of the second boat that was launched. These 
boats were turned over and over, and many were 
drowned in trying to get into them, as every time 
they would turn bottom side up they would bury from 
fifty to seventy-five, who were trying to climb in from 
the opposite side. This was kept up until the crowd 
had thinned out and the boats drifted off. I doubt 
whether any were saved in the life-boats, except, possi- 
bly, a few who clung to their keels as they drifted down 
the river. Steward and I kept ourselves occupied in 
throwing overboard such things as we could manage 
to tear loose from the state-rooms — doors, blinds, etc. 
After working awhile we started for the passenger-cabin 
to see if we could not obtain a life-preserver, but found 
the steam had filled the cabin and fire was then 
breaking out near the centre of the boat, and had 
spread nearly to the upper deck. We then made our 
way to the lower deck again, and there, in company 
with several others, helped throw over one of the large 
state planks, but it had no more than struck the water 
13 



IQ4 CAHABA. 

before the crowd got on to it, and it was rolled over, 
and we concluded it was not safe to undertake to 
escape by that. We then got hold of a mule and tried 
to force it overboard, but did not succeed. The fire 
was then working well to the stern of the boat, and it 
was impossible to get the mule to go a step toward 
the fire. 

" We saw Captain Mason, master of the boat, in his 
shirt-sleeves and bare-headed, trying to restore order, 
and asking the crowd to quiet down and be patient, 
as he thought we would receive assistance very shortly; 
but to quiet the excitement under such circumstances 
w^as impossible. 

" Quite a number of ladies came out of the cabin, 
knelt upon the deck, and, resting their heads upon 
the rail of the stern of the boat, prayed for help. The 
captain tried to quiet them by saying that he thought 
that help would reach us soon. Of all the seventeen 
lady passengers on board only one was saved, and 
several of the wives of the deck hands were also lost, 
which,! think, made a total of twenty-two ladies lost. 
I believe Captain Mason did all that any person could 
do under the circumstances. He and a majority of 
the officers of the boat were among the lost. 
Finding that nothing further could be done, and the 
flames were gradually working to the rear, and the 
entire boat now nearly in flames, I stepped on the 
after-guard and held that position until the flames 



A STRUGGLE FOR LIFE. 1 95 

drove me off. I stayed as long as I could in hopes 
that the crowd would be dispersed. It was almost 
sure death to jump while the crowd was around the 
boat, as hundreds were seizing anything that came 
within their reach and pulled others under in order to 
save their own lives. Steward jumped overboard first 
with his clothes all on, while I undressed, being afraid 
that their weight would so encumber me that I might 
not be able to reach shore, not having entirely re- 
covered from my wounds received nearly two years 
previous ; then I made a leap, diving head foremost, and 
getting away without any one catching hold of me. 
Coming to the surface of the water a short distance 
from the boat, and getting my hair out of my face, I 
looked back and could see quite a number leaping 
from the boat at the time, and as I drifted out of sight 
I could still see by the light of the boat persons cling- 
ing to her. 

" I got hold of a small piece of board, on which I 
rested myself and drifted with the current, as the night 
was very dark and it was impossible to see which way 
to swim to shore. I drifted in this position for some 
fifteen or twenty minutes, when I came upon a party 
who was resting upon one end of a door, the other end 
of which was raised out of the water. I ran against it 
before I saw it, and rested myself upon it, which gave 
me more support than the board. In this way I got 
along well for some distance. I tried to talk to my 



I q6 cahaba. 

companion, but could not get any reply. He seemed 
to be hurt in some way. All this time I could hear 
people calling and praying for help, while others, who 
were reasonably secure upon state planks, bales of 
hay, etc., were using their old prison slang and ex- 
pressions, that one would hardly think it possible for 
men to use under such circumstances — such as : * Lie 
down and keep cool,' ' hot skillet,' ' fresh fish,' ' keep 
your hands on your pocketbook,' ' swim or die,' and 
such expressions as would only be used by men who 
had been for years accustomed to the hardships of 
severe campaigns and been inured to misfortunes of 
all kinds. 

" About that time a steamer came down the river 
and rendered all the assistance possible, by throw- 
ing over hay, launching their yawls and life-boats, in 
which they carried a torch in the bow of the boat, and 
throwing ropes, and picking up such as came in 
their wake. A yawl came near us when I called for 
help, and a rope was thrown to me, but as I reached 
with my right hand for the rope, my companion 
reached for me and got hold of my hair, which 
at the time was very long. He seized my hair 
with a grasp firm enough to pull me on my back 
and p-et me under water, but his hold soon relaxed, 
and as I came up the yawl passed out of sight, 
and I was again left in darkness and drifted along 
with the current of the river. I was a good swimmer, 



DRIFTING WITH THE CURRENT. 1 97 

but realized the fact that I could do nothing but 
keep above water, so I made no effort only to float, 
in hopes the current would cany me ashore. I 
drifted along for some time, when I ran into a stump 
that was floating in the water and struck it with 
so much force that there are now three small scars 
on my breast made by the sharp roots of that 
stump. 

" Those who have any knowledge of trying to handle 
a round piece of timber in the water can realize how 
difficult it is to support one's self, especially in the cur- 
rent of the river, upon a piece of wood of such ill 
shape as a stump with roots protruding in all direc- 
tions. Though having had years of experience, in 
fact from childhood, with such upon the lakes in sport, 
it was impossible for me to balance myself upon this 
stump, and after trying for some time until I was 
nearly exhausted, I had to give it up for fear it 
would wear me out, and I again struck out and let 
the current carry me along. It was not long after 
that when day began to break, and I could see a dark 
spot ahead of me that looked like shore, but before I 
fully realized the fact I struck against a lot of drift- 
wood and threw myself out upon it, and in a very 
short time was on solid foundation. Here I met four 
or five of the boys, who had reached this point before 
me. I seemed strong, though I had been in the water 
nearly two hours, but when the air struck me I wilted 



198 CAHABA. 

like a leaf, and though knowing perfectly well what 
was the matter with me, I was not able to help 
myself, and had it not been for those on the drift I 
would have chilled to death in a very short time ; but 
the boys gave me prompt assistance, and after consid- 
erable rubbing I was again on my feet and ready to 
assist others. As I was without any clothing, one of 
the boys, who had wrung out his clothing until it had 
become partially dry, gave me a shirt, and in company 
with two or three others I w^ent into the water several 
times to help others upon the drift. 

" Persons not used to the water would invariably be 
carried under by the current, as they would grab the 
log, the log revolving and carrying them under ; it was 
only those who were used to this who could throw 
themselves upon a log in the water, and we watched 
closely for the few that came within reach. By 
stretching out upon the logs, holding each other's feet, 
one of us managed to keep close to the water's edge — 
in fact, lay so the water could run over us all the 
time, and in that way we pulled out three or four who 
struck our drift. 

*' It was then daylight, and as I was running from one 
log to another trying to strike another drift where we 
saw one of our number hanging to some brush to assist 
him on top of the logs, I heard my name called, and 
on looking around found it was my friend Steward, 
who had landed within ten rods of the spot, though I 



S/ST£J^S OF CHARITY. 1 99 

had not seen him since we jumped from the steamer 
until that moment. 

" Soon after a steamer came across from Memphis 
and we were taken aboard and cared for by the Sisters 
of Charity, who did all in their power for those who 
were picked up. I was taken' to the Soldiers' Home 
with my friend Steward, where we remained until 
we got a supply of clothing, when some of General 
Washburn's staff came and took the names of those 
who were not hurt and were able to give an account 
of the explosion. Myself, with about fifteen others, 
reported at General Washburn's headquarters, and 
there I was requested to answer such questions as 
were put to me by one of the staff officers — as to my 
knowledge of the explosion of the steamer, what I 
saw, etc. 

" After being dismissed from General Washburn's 
headquarters. Steward and I smuggled our way on, 
board a steamer, and, being out of money, begged our 
way home, telling our story as we went. I reached 
my home, Kelley's Island, O., on May 5th, 1865, at 
one o'clock in the morning, having rowed across Lake 
Erie in a row-boat, a distance of twelve miles from 
Sandusky City." 



CHAPTER XVI. 

FOOD AT CASTLE MORGAN — DECAYED BEEF POOR QUAL- 
ITY OF MEAL A CONFEDERATE INSPECTOR-GEN- 
ERAL IS INDIGNANT AT THE FOOD FURNISHED TO 
CAPTIVES THERE REPORT OF CONFEDERATE IN- 
SPECTOR-GENERAL CHANDLER — HE CALLS ATTEN- 
TION TO THE ABUNDANCE OF FOOD REMENYI 

ECLIPSED RATS — LICE. 

IN the previous chapter we have reviewed some 
of the reasons for the silence of history upon 
the subject of Cahaba and its prison. To treat the 
subject fully it was necessary to anticipate some facts, 
and depart from the chronological order that had 
previously been followed. We return now to a con- 
sideration of the daily life of the men there con- 
fined. 

The average full ration for one day furnished to us 
was a scant pint and a half of corn-meal uncooked, 
ground coarse, and containing ground cob, bacon, a 
piece the size of the first two fingers of an ordinary 



PRISON FARE. 20I 

hand, and a small amount of salt. On rare occasions, 
cow peas — a kind of colored bean usually infested with 
bugs — was issued, more rarely molasses was issued — 
perhaps a dozen times in six months. 

Pumpkins were said to have been issued to some of 
the men. I never saw a pumpkin while there. Flour 
replaced meal a very few times. About one fourth 
of the time beef was issued in lieu of bacon. This 
was all— no vinegar, no pepper, no sugar, no vege- 
tables. For all practical purposes only the meal, ba- 
con, beef, and salt need be mentioned; the other 
articles named were but luxuries. That a comparison 
may be made between the amount furnished us and 
the amount deemed necessary to sustain properly the 
average soldier, I give the United States Army ration : 
Corn-meal when issued in place of flour, 20 ozs. ; fresh 
beef, 20 ozs., or bacon, 12 ozs.; rice, 1.6 ozs. ; peas (or 
beans), 2.4 ozs.; coffee browned, 1.28 ozs.; sugar, 2.4 
ozs. ; vinegar, i gill ; pepper, 0.4 oz. ; salt, 0.6 oz. ; with 
occasional issues of potatoes, desiccated vegetables, 
etc. 

If any one will weigh the amount of meal and meat 
I have stated as our daily ration, they will learn that 
it was not more than half of what is deemed necessary 
for the soldiers of our army, to whom were also issued 
the other articles I have named. In tabular form the 
disparity is more obvious. 



202 



CAHABA. 



U. S. ARMY RATION DAILY. 



Corn-meal . . 

Bacon, in lieu of beef. . 
Beef, in lieu of bacon. . 

Peas 

Rice 

Coffee 

Sugar 

Vinegar 

Pepper 

Salt 

Potatoes 

Desiccated vegetables. . 



20 ozs. 
12 " 
20 " 
2.4 " 
1.6 " 
1.28 " 
2.4 " 
I gill. 
0.4 oz. 
0.6 " 
occasional. 



CAHABA RATION DAILY. 



Corn-meal, of which a 
small part was ground 
cobs and husks 

Bacon, in lieu of beef. . 

Beef, in lieu of bacon . . 

Peas infested with bugs 

Rice 

Coffee 

Sugar 

Vinegar 

Pepper 

Salt perhaps 

Potatoes 

Desiccated vegetables. 



10 to 12 ozs. 

5 to 7 " 

8 to 10 " 

very rarely. 

none. 



0.6 oz. 
none. 



On October i6th, D. T. Chandler, Assistant In- 
spector-General C. S. A., visited Cahaba in his offi- 
cial capacity, and in reporting upon the condition of 
Castle Morgan, makes use of the following language : 
(See Congressional Report, Treatment Prisoners, page 
698.) " Their food has consisted exclusively of bread 
([?] should be corn-meal) and meat ; two issues of 
rice only having been made them since June last (?>., 
in four months), and no peas or beans in lieu of it, 
those on hand being utterly unfit for use. The reason 
assigned for this failure (the guard forces having re- 
ceived rice regularly during this time) is that the com- 
missary was not ordered to issue it. The command- 
ing officer (Colonel Jones) states that he was under 
the impression they always received it. 



OFFENSIVE BEEF. 2O3 

" No vinegar has been issued for some months past, 
although the assistant commissary, Captain Whea- 
don, informs me good vinegar could be readily ob- 
tained at Mobile by writing for it. 

"This is an eligible locality for a prison depot, not 
only for the facilities of transportation of supplies and 
prisoners, but for subsisting them cheaply and procur- 
ing for them the vegetable food of the adjacent coun- 
try." 

The statement made above as to the kind and quan- 
tity of rations furnished, and confirmed by the quo- 
tation from the report of Inspector-General Chandler, 
was not the most unpleasant feature of our commis- 
sariat. The quantity was inadequate, the quality was 
too often disgusting. 

For the first day or two after our arrival at Castle 
Morgan it was moderately cool, and at that time 
fresh beef was supplied instead of the usual bacon. 
When the weather was cool the beef did not become 
offensive by the time it was brought into prison, but 
as it was usually exceedingly hot, especially during 
the middle of the days of the summer and early fall 
months, sour, nauseating beef was more often the 
rule than the exception. The aroma perceived while 
cutting it was not like that of the new-blown rose, 
so I sought among the men of my company for one 
whose stomach would not easily revolt. I found a 
sergeant of a Michigan regiment — one who declared 



204 



CAHABA. 



that nothing could make him sick — and persuaded 
him into relieving me from the duty of dividing the 
beef among the different messes. 

Men so hungry they could have eaten any food, 
however coarse, could not overcome the natural 
loathing of the decaying, offensive meat, and it was 
by them tossed away. Knowing the wonderful power 
of charcoal to absorb gases, offensive or inoffen- 
sive, I tried it upon the offensive meat. Charcoal 
could be gathered from our little fires, then it was 
broken into small pieces, a layer placed in the bottom 
of some dish, then beef and charcoal in alternate lay- 
ers were placed on this ; it blackened the meat, but if 
the putrefaction was only superficial, usually the offen- 
sive odors were absorbed, the smell of decay removed, 
and the carrion became edible. So strong, however, 
were the prejudices of some, they could not and, 
seemingly, would not understand that the meat had 
undergone a process of purification, and to them the 
blackened beef was more disgusting than when red 
and slippery. Others quickly grasped the idea of 
disinfecting the meat, but, careless in their methods, 
or urged on by hunger, they hastened to cook and 
consume it before it had been fully disinfected. As a 
result the putrefactive products produced violent eme- 
sis and catharsis, and henceforth the mere sight of 
the beef bleached their cheeks and brought the cold 
sweat of qualmishness and nausea from every pore. 



GROUND COB. 



205 



Our other chief food was meal ground quite coarse. 
With the meal was always to be found a quite consid- 
erable amount of ground cob. Believing that the cob 
only added bulk to the amount, and was of no nutri- 
tive value, besides having the fault of making our 
bread or mush unpalatable and irritating to the bowels, 
some one of our mess proposed that we make a sieve 
and sift out the coarse, innutritions parts. To this all 
readily agreed, and, taking a half canteen, we punctured 
it with a nail borrowed from another comrade, mak- 
ing holes by actual measurement three sixteenths of 
an inch square; this we used for a day or two, and at 
first we were all proud of ourselves — proud of our 
aesthetic taste and refinement. Ordway even showed 
symptoms of a poetic attack. During our first dinner 
of the sifted meal we cast refined, pitying glances at 
our neighbors, who were eating their unsifted meal 
ash cake as rude Goths or even Cave-dwellers might 
have eaten it ; but in our " refined" sifting process we 
separated and lost nearly one fifth of our too scanty 
rations. 

At the third process of sifting there could be de- 
tected upon the countenances of several of our mess 
a diminution of the ethereal expression to which the 
discovery of the sieve had given birth, and the hungry 
countenance of Nattie as he saw our ration of p^round 
corn diminished by the little pile of coarse cob sifted 
from it, bore a decidedly human, matter-of-fact, hun- 



206 CAHABA, 

gry look, and in spite of our self-pride the expression 
of Nattie was contagious. None of us would admit 
that we were wrong in estimating the lack of nutri- 
tive value in the corn-cob sifted out ; none would as- 
sume the responsibility of going back to our Vandal 
food ; but somehow our sieve was only used a couple 
of days, and no one protested when we noticed that in 
our sieve every little hole punched by the nail was 
carefully closed by a little wooden plug and the half 
canteen returned to use again as a dipper. Our in- 
tellects could understand that the coarse cob in our 
meal was of no more value than its bulk of sawdust, 
but our stomachs were carnal, obstinate, unreason- 
able, and somehow undermined the reasoning facul- 
ties. 

Those who had been so fortunate as to have and to 
have retained any money could purchase from the 
guards and from a so-called sutler, sweet-potatoes, 
melons, green-corn, peaches, peanuts, and flour bread, 
but for every one man who could be found with the 
Confederate equivalent of five greenback dollars a 
hundred men were there who had not a dime. 

When food was wanted, a very common mode of 
preparing it was to boil water in our kettle and stir in 
meal — in other words, make meal " mush," which was 
the most economical method of using wood. When 
we made bread (.?) we usually poured hot water on 
the meal, half-cooking it in that way, and placed 



SCANT RATIONS. 20/ 

the doughgin the kettle, and that upon the embers. 
Our fires were made of such a size that the least pos- 
sible amount of heat was wasted. 

It cannot with truth be urged that there was not 
sufficient food in the Confederacy to feed its pris- 
oners ; those who have sought to exculpate the Con- 
federates have made such a plea, and have with 
truth asserted that even their armies in the field were 
often on half rations and no rations whatever. 

The same statement was occasionally as true of the 
Union army, and every man who passed one year 
or four at the front can recall many days of scant 
rations. But, admitting that the large armies in Vir- 
ginia, by reason of insufficient transportation, were 
not always well supplied, the fault was not to be at- 
tributed to scarcity of food, but to defective trans- 
portation, an excuse not valid in Alabama. Dallas 
County, Ala., in which Cahaba was situated, was one 
of the best agricultural sections of the South. In- 
spector-General Chandler calls attention to this fact 
in his report of October i6th, 1864, from which I have 
quoted above, and garrulous Planter Hatcher again 
and again called my attention to the abundance of 
food growing within our vision, and the unlimited re- 
sources of the South in that direction, as he guarded 
us back after our escape. 

It was remarkable, the various common and strange 
and unhallowed dishes evolved from our coarse corn- 



208 CAHABA. 

meal. I have heard Remenyi play upon a single 
string of his violin, but with us were a hundred 
" artists," who with corn-meal could eclipse in their 
own way the marvellous feats of Remenyi, and, 
more remarkable still, the genius they possessed was 
never even suspected until they had been for a time 
the unwilling guests of Colonel Jones. Browned in a 
skillet it became the basis for " coffee " or " tea ;" it was 
fried in grease and boiled in water, mixed with the 
bacon and mixed with beef. It was sifted and the 
refuse soaked for days, and then all the possible 
changes rung upon this production. It was soaked 
in water till soured and then appropriated the name 
of " corn beer." 

A different name was given to every different shade 
and taste, and a nomenclature of unsavory names — 
names without precedent — was one of the peculiarities 
of our cook-yard. 

But prepare our corn-meal and bacon as we would, 
or our beef even when it could be eaten, they were not 
sufficient in quantity to drive away the sensation of 
ravenous hunger which so much of the time was 
gnawing at our vitals and tormenting the hours of 
day and night. During the day the mind could be 
occupied, wheedled away into the consideration of 
other subjects ; but at night it returned again and 
again to a remembrance of the cause of its uneasi- 
ness. Most of the boys about us told of being tan- 



IMAGINARY FEASTS. 209 

talized in sleep by food coming near them and then 
eluding their grasp ; in this my experience was differ- 
ent from theirs, and was quite peculiar. 

I had entered the prison in the most vigorous health, 
and blessed with an appetite that made no discrimina- 
tion among foods that were edible. Like the rest, I di- 
vided my day's ration into equal parts, consuming 
them one in the morning, the other in the afternoon ; 
but as soon as I had gone to sleep I nearly always 
began to dream of being at home, and as soon as I 
would enter the house I at once went to the pantry 
and began to eat. 

Oh, what delightful lunches I used to get in those 
dream journeys to the home pantry ! Everythino- 
I ate tasted natural. Everything was of the most 
delightful flavor. In my dreams I was often sur- 
prised at the enormous quantities I ate ; and 
though it seemed to somewhat allay my hunger, 
I often thought it strange that 1 could not feel 
fully satisfied. 

Among men who had entered the prison in health, 
it seemed almost the rule for them to dream of food ; 
but I never heard one mention of having his hunger 
allayed by food eaten in dreamland. 

After what seemed to be hours passed in eating, I 

would awake with all my hunger still remaining; and 

it was impossible to go to sleep again until something 

was introduced into the stomach to allay the gnawing. 

14 



2IO CAHABA. 

So in the darkness I would go to the water-barrel and 
drink, cheating the poor stomach into the belief that 
its demands were being complied with ; but the fraud 
perpetrated upon it was always discovered before the 
forenoon meal. 

So long as health remained, for several months 
the same experience was often repeated : go to 
the bed of sand at nine p.m., dream of food till 
one or two a.m., awake, go to the water-barrel, 
drink, and return to sleep again, if the rats would 
permit sleep. 

Rats were a source of much annoyance to us who 
slept upon the ground. Hardly would I get asleep 
when one or more would be snuffing about some 
portion of my body. If away from my head and hands 
they gave me much less disturbance ; but when two or 
three were determined to see what was under my neck, 
and if an obstruction was met proceeded to remove it 
with their paws or teeth (even though it should be my 
flesh), sleep was an utter impossibility. 

At first they made me " nervous," lest they should 
do me serious injury before I should awake ; but after 
several nights' experience that feeling was supplanted 
by one of irritation — irritation that they should keep 
waking me up so many times during the night, an 
annoyance that at length became nearly unendurable. 

When I had been there about ten days I was awak- 
ened one night very easily by one digging under me. 



THE "PLAGUE OF RATS." 211 

I was lying on one side at the time, and the little tor- 
ment was digging a " tunnel" under my shoulder-blade. 
Waiting motionless until I was fully awake, I suddenly 
rolled on my back and caught him fairly between my 
shoulders, tie struggled, squealed, and fought to re- 
lease himself; but grinding him between the shoulder 
and the ground, he was soon past the stage of aggres- 
sion. Then, grasping his villainous throat between a 
thumb and two fingers, his days of troubling respect- 
able and peaceably inclined prisoners were at an 
end. 

I mention the " plague of rats" only to fill out the 
picture of real life at Cahaba. Our experience with 
the rodents was not excessively repugnant to us after 
we became accustomed to it, but was one of a multi- 
plicity of uncanny surroundings from which there could 
be no escape except by exchange or death, or — worse 
than death — by enlistment into the Confederate Army. 

The little squad captured about Tupelo and Ponto- 
toc, to which Gere, Frazier, Bartolph, Grimes, my- 
self, and others belonged, were all captured during the 
heat of midsummer, and were clothed but meagrely. 
Among all those just named there was not a single 
blanket, and I think not a man who possessed a coat. 
My own wardrobe on entering the prison in July 
consisted of a hat, shirt, pair of pants, and boots; dur- 
ing the escape of Grimes, Gere, and myself, all w^ore 
out our boots, and so tore our shirts upon briers and 



2 I 2 CAHABA. 

branches, that a month or two later they could not be 
worn, and were thrown away. 

By October ist my wardrobe was narrowed down 
to a hat and pair of pants, though in early winter 
I became possessor of an old thin, threadbare blouse. 

Sleeping in the sand without a blanket, and exposed 
to the sun and rain thus scantily clad, my skin became 
as brown and rough as the feet of children who, bare- 
footed, have played and run in mud and sand for a 
whole summer. 

There was another pest as persistent as hunger, 
more disgusting than rats — a pest that crawled upon 
our clothing by day, that crawled over our bodies, 
into the ears, even into the nostrils and mouths, by 
night. 

In the whole prison I do not think there were twen- 
ty combs, and certainly I never saw a single fine-tooth- 
ed comb. I had no comb — it was appropriated by For- 
rest's men — and I did not know a friend wljo had one. 
There was not in the whole prison, to'my knowledge, a 
pair of scissors. A razor was an unknown article, so our 
hair became long and tangled. Some one occasional- 
ly obtained from without the prison a pair of scissors ; 
but most men who wished to trim the hair and beard 
had recourse to a jack-knife or burned away the ends 
of the hair and beard by means of little firebrands 
and coals. These statements properly precede what 
we must say upon the loathsome subject of lice. 



BESIEGED BY VERMIN. 213 

The subject fills one with disgust, and among re- 
spectable persons the bare mention of the name puts 
into the mind a feeling of repulsion and loathsome- 
ness. Persons who have for a lifetime been sur- 
rounded by the neatness and comforts of home life can 
hardly comprehend that any except the scum of 
society should bear upon their persons these insignia 
of degradation and filth. 

These vermin were in the prison when we entered 
it ; and as Castle Morgan had been used for a prison 
for many months, doubtless all who had been there 
confined had had the same experience as ourselves. 
Even the sand, warmed by the sultry summer's sun, 
swarmed with the crawling pests ; and any person who 
lay down, sat down, or stood within the prison grounds 
during the warm, oppressive weather was sure to be- 
come conscious of their loathsome presence. 

It is nearly an impossibility to give a true picture of 
Southern prison life, with its sad, unpleasant features, 
except by entering into the details of every-day life, and 
from that only a dim outline is formed. The feature 
of which I write is one that many persons shrink from 
presenting to their hearers, feeling that a certain odium 
will attach to themselves should they state the truth 
in regard to it. 

I trust that any who may read these pages will ob- 
serve that, with the want of facilities in our Southern 
prisons, it was an impossibility for even the scrupu- 



2 14 CAHABA. 

lously neat to keep themselves free from the disgust- 
incf vermin. 

The plague of lice visited upon an ancient people 
could hardly have been much worse than was our con- 
dition. No Aaron had stretched forth his hand and 
changed the dust to lice, but the result was the same. 
One day one of our mess washed his shirt, and to kill 
all animal life that might be present, he put it into a 
bucket and poured upon it an abundance of hot water. 
Shortly after he went to his bed of sand and lay down 
to rest. A half hour later, conscious that he was again 
infested, he took care to count the number that had 
crawled upon the garment from the sand in that short 
time, and counted sixty-nine. How many had jour- 
neyed onto his pants, hat, hair, and elsewhere upon his 
body, can only be guessed. 

I have seen men too sick to give themselves any at- 
tention, with hair so full of lice that if the original 
color of the hair was black, the head of the person 
would be gray ; and if they had scratched their bodies 
with their finger-nails, it would be hard to find an inch 
of skin free from scratches and resulting scabs and scars. 

I remember numerous instances where men, reduced 
by disease and miserable food, would scratch the skin, 
especially of the head, and a small abrasion would re- 
sult. To such abrasions (especially as a large num- 
ber of the men had no hats) flies would be attracted, 
and upon the scratch would deposit their eggs. Mag- 



A FALSE REPORT. 



215 



gots in a short time would be found burrowing under 
the scalp, and collecting together in bodies beneath the 
skin, would form tumors, from which, when punctured, 
quantities of larvae, from a few drops to a tablespoon- 
ful, would flow out. 

I repeat, it is painful to write these facts, it is disgust- 
ing to read them ; but these pages are the true story of a 
prison life — the story of hardships endured by men that 
their country might not be wrecked. 

In the report of D. T. Chandler, Lieutenant-Colonel 
C. S. A., Inspector-General of Prisons, dated October 
i6th, 1864, after stating that nearly all prisoners at Ca- 
haba were much in need of clothing, and that nearly all 
were without blankets or other bedding, he continues: 
" A very insufficient supply of cooking utensils has been 
furnished them, and there are but three (3) worn-out 
axes for the use of the whole number, in consequence 
of which they are unable to prepare their rations, 
which are issued to them uncooked ;" and earlier in the 
year Dr. Whitfield, Surgeon C. S. A., states : " The wood 
(less than one half the regulations allow) has been, 
when furnished at all, of either green sap pine or de- 
cayed oak from old fields." (See Report Congres- 
sional Committee.) 

Lieutenant-Colonel Chandler doubtless believed 
that " three worn-out axes" had been furnished to the 
more than two thousand men in Castle Morgan 
at that time ; but my memory retains no recol- 



2 I 6 CAHABA. 

lection of having ever seen an axe during all the long 
months of confinement there; and the reason assigned 
at the time was that the possession of an axe was pro- 
hibited — was a criminal offence, and worthy of severe 
punishment. 

How did men chop their wood and split it if we 
were not allowed to possess an axe ? To Cahaba 
at one time a railroad had extended ; but at the 
time of which I write the road was not in operation, 
and quite likely had been largely torn up. A large 
number of railroad spikes were to be picked up by 
hunting for them, and a few found their way into 
the prison. These were to be bought at one dollar 
each. Confederate money. They were used as wedges, 
and by them wood could be split into small pieces 
and broken to the desired lengths. Such spikes were 
a luxury, and only the " millionaires" of the prison 
could afford such gross extravagance. Most of the 
" plebeians" were content to use wedge-shaped pieces 
of wood, which in turn became fuel when they had per- 
formed their vicarious services. 

How much wood was allowed to each man for the 
purposes of cooking.? Most of the wood was cut up 
the Alabama River, a distance of several miles, was 
thrown into the river and rafted together, towed down 
to the prison, taken out of the river, and divided among 
the thirty or more companies. A piece of wood ten 
feet long and six inches in diameter was an average 



COOKING UTENSILS. 21 7 

piece for ten men for ten days. By rare good luck we 
sometimes obtained more than this, even twice as 
much as the amount stated. Figure on this for a 
moment, and it will appear that the quantity of wood 
allowed per man was equivalent to a stick twelve 
inches long and six inches in diameter for ten days, 
and that usually considerably damp and sometimes 
perfectly green. 

Don't say this cannot be true ! It is true ; and any 
man who was in Castle Morgan and made any reliable 
notes upon the matter will verify my statement. If 
any man received more than the quantity I have men- 
tioned he was more fortunate than I or any of my 

mess. 

How could men cook their food with such small 
quantities of wood ? The wood was usually split into 
pieces not thicker than one's finger and -laid in the 
sun to dry, or stood on end about the fire, that it 
might be dried by its heat. I have known men to let 
it lay upon the ground by the side of their bodies while 
sleeping, that the warmth of their bodies might serve 
to dry it. But such action was not conducive to 
health nor comfort. 

Our cooking utensils were usually one, sometimes 

"two " Dutch" ovens or kettles for ten men. As each 

mess of ten was usually subdivided into two messes of 

five each, and as each subdivision cooked twice daily, 

making mush or bread, frying bacon, browning meal, 



2l8 CAHABA. 

making coffee, etc,, it is not difficult to perceive that a 
single kettle was "kept hopping;" and even in the for- 
tunate squad where there were two kettles, those use- 
ful utensils had no time to be " loafing around the 
throne." 



CHAPTER XVII. 

"muggers" and thieves — A POLICE COURT FORMED 

WILLIAM REA, A CITIZEN PRISONER, MADE POLICE 

JUDGE. 

AMONG the captives in every place of confine- 
ment in the South were men who were human 
ghouls and jackals ; their thoughts were always of 
plunder, and their acts often of rapine and violence 
In Andersonville and Florence and Libby they were 
known as N'Yaarkers ; in Castle Morgan they were 
called " muggers." In civil life the mugger had 
usually been a " rough." If he came from the city, 
his associates had been gamblers, " shoulder-hitters," 
thieves, and " sports." If he came from the country, 
he was often a dissipated loafer, a bully, a marauder. 
He had usually enlisted and deserted again and agg,in, 
always under an assumed name, for the bounty paid 
by many towns and counties. So rare were his enlist- 
ments due to unselfish motives that they are unworthy 
of mention. 

A few months of experience with his class rendered 
recruiting officers and guards more vigilant in their 



2 20 CAHABA. 

supervision of him, and their eyes were never off from 
him until he was turned over to the regiment to 
which he had been assigned. 

Under the restraint of rigorous martial rules in the 
army he became less objectionable, and in rare in- 
stances signalized himself by bravery and reckless dis- 
regard of danger ; but on the march he was always 
at the front if anything there could be stolen, was 
usually at the rear if there was a prospect of battle. 
Having enlisted from no motive of patriotism, and 
the restraints of military life becoming irksome to him, 
he fell out from the ranks, and had few regrets when 
captured by the scouts of the enemy. Captivity 
promised him a change, and any change from the 
curb of soldier life was acceptable. This, in brief, 
was the history of a large number of the men whom 
we designated as " muggers." 

A few days only in the larger depots for the col- 
lection of prisoners were all that was necessary to 
acquaint them with those who would be their natural 
associates, and a few days in Castle Morgan made the 
separate bands homogeneous ; and, following the lead 
of those who had been longest there confined, they 
devoted themselves to robbing and thieving from 
their respectable fellow-prisoners. 

In no place before had the mugger been so favor- 
ably situated for carrying on his hellish work. Within 
the prison there was no law, no protection, no power 



'* muggers:' 221 

to which the injured individual could appeal for jus- 
tice ; his only shield was his own right arm. 

The prison guards had no jurisdiction over the 
personal wrongs of the prisoners, or, if they could 
have exerted any power, never cared to do so ; their 
business only was to see that no man escaped. 

The N'Yaarkers doubtless were so designated be- 
cause so large a per cent of their numbers had been 
enlisted in the slums of the Empire City ; the genus 
adopted the name of the species. Some person, curi- 
ous as to the meaning of words, may ask whence 
these thugs received their guttural, uneuphonious 
name. The average robber assaults his victim from 
behind ; the mugger assailed the one he would rob 
when standing almost face to face with him. Ac- 
cepting this explanation for the origin of his cog- 
nomen, mugger would be synonymous with " facer " 
(mug, slang for face), one who faced his victim at the 
moment of assault. 

Although their number was not a tithe of our 
whole body, they were for a time more than a match 
for all of us. They were organized, or at least quite 
well understood each other. The rest were not or- 
ganized. Whenever one of their number was in any 
difficulty or danger, a gang of his confederates were 
immediately at hand to give assistance if needed. If 
one not of their gang had an encounter with them, 
he usually had to fight it out alone, unless personal 



222 CAHABA. 

friends, whom he had known previous to his imprison- 
ment, should come to his aid. 

Looking back to those dreary months, and know- 
ing what we knew in the latter part of our incarcera- 
tion, it is easy to see how we could have abated the 
nuisance of " muggers." But it was only after many 
weeks of their outrages that we awoke to the real 
condition of affairs. 

Their method of procedure was about as follows: 
The guard upon the stockade would announce a new 
lot of prisoners on an incoming boat. When these 
had been taken to the provost marshal's office and 
officially robbed and their names enrolled, they were 
guarded to the stockade. The cry of " fresh fish " 
(new prisoners) is shouted through the prison, and 
all gather at the gate to see the new-comers. The 
muggers marked their intended victims, and when the 
hours of darkness gave them the sought-for oppor- 
tunity, they were garroted in the following manner : 
One of their number, usually of more than medium 
height, would approach the victim, standing amazed 
at his new surroundings. When the mugger was 
almost face to face with the new prisoner, he stepped 
to the right side of his prey, threw his own right arm 
across the breast of the victim, resting his hand upon 
the left shoulder of the new-comer ; by a quick move- 
ment of his own body, he placed his back and right 
hip against the right shoulder, back, and right hip of 



METHOD OF ROBBING PRISONERS. 



223 



the man to be robbed ; then, bending forward, the 
stru2rs:Hnof, half-choked victim is Hfted almost from his 
feet, and is as helpless as a babe. A fellow-robber is 
at hand to "go through" the pockets of the half- 
strangled man. When everything of value has been 
taken from the poor fellow he is released, and with 
a blow sent, stunned and staggering, otf into darkness, 
or left temporarily senseless on the ground. 

One after another of the new men are thus robbed 
within a few days or weeks after their arrival, and ere- 
long a new supply of men furnish a new supply of 
victims for the fiends who fatten upon their ill-gotten 
plunder. 

But robbery of the new and old prisoners was not 
confined entirely to the methods we have described ; 
the large amount of booty secured by the robbers 
gave them the position and influence that wealth so 
commonly secures to its possessors. Like some of 
the " money-crats " who before, during, and since that 
time have waxed powerful by similar proceedings, 
they sought more refined ways of robbery. Through 
the guards they procured chloroform, and carefully 
anaesthetizing a sleeping fellow-prisoner, would lei- 
surely examine every pocket, and cut open any coat 
in which they suspected might be concealed aught 
that could be of value to themselves. 

An attempt to chloroform and rob the sergeant of 
a Missouri remment awakened the inmates of the 



'&* 



2 24 CAHABA. 

prison to the necessity of organizing ourselves against 
them, and finally led to their punishment, and to driv- 
ing many from the prison by enlistment into the Con- 
federate service. 

The sergeant was an intelligent German, a member 
of the Fourth Missouri Cavalry, named Raymond. 
He had on his person when captured a valuable 
gold watch and chain, and twenty-five or thirty 
dollars xw currency ; the watch, chain, and fifteen 
dollars of his money he succeeded in secreting 
between the lining and outside leather of his boots. 
The money left in his pocket was taken from him 
when he was searched on entering the prison the first 
time. 

He had been in the prison but a few weeks when 
the thieves succeeded in stealing the chain concealed 
in one of his boots, but did not obtain the watch. 

For three weeks thereafter he was left undisturbed 
to lull his watchfulness ; then a mugger who passed 
under the name of Thompson, and claimed to be 
a member of the Second Michigan Cavalry, deter- 
mined to chloroform Raymond and secure the watch. 
Creeping cautiously to the side of the sergeant, 
who was sleeping upon the ground, Thompson 
poured chloroform upon a rag, and held it near his 
face. Raymond till this moment had been uncon- 
scious ; but the strong fumes of the chloroform 
aroused him instantly, and in a second he was wide 



ORGANIZING A POLICE COURT. 225 

awake and struggling with his assailant, whom he 
instantly recognized. As the sergeant was physi- 
cally a man of more than average strength, the 
mugger struggled only to escape, and for that time 
succeeded, but on the following day was arrested by 
men in the prison and held until a court and police 
force could be organized for his trial and punishment, 
and for the punishment of any of his gang who 
might thereafter be guilty of pursuing their ruffianly 
course. 

In Castle Morgan at that time were several men of 
wealth, influence, and sound judgment. One was 
a citizen of Macon County, III, a Mr. St. John ; an- 
other was a sergeant of the Twelfth (.?) Iowa Infantry, 
a man of middle age, a Freemason, who afterward, 
through the influence of a Confederate Masonic 
brother, was paroled from the prison and given the 
liberty of the town. 

Another citizen was William Rea, a neighbor of 
Mr. St. John. His home was near Decatur, 111. 
Comparatively young, he was one of the wealthiest 
farmers of his State. He owned fifty thousand acres 
of fine farming land in Macon and Piatt counties. 
His brother-in-law was Colonel Froman, of the One 
Hundred and Sixteenth Illinois Infantry. He was an 
intimate friend of General Oglesby, and was well 
acquainted with Lincoln, Grant, Logan, and Yates — a 
strong phalanx of Western men. His instincts were 
IS 



2 26 CAHABA. 

right, and his associations had been with those who 
had added strength to a character by nature strong. 
He had been captured in the latter part of June on a 
train near Dalton, Ga. 

The husband of his sister, Colonel Froman, had 
died in a hospital in Chattanooga in June, and to 
send his body home for burial, Mr. Rea had gone 
to that city. The object of his visit accomplished 
here, he started for Sherman's army to see his two 
boys. One of these had enlisted, at the age of sixteen, 
in the Thirty-fifth Illinois ; the other, at fourteen, 
a few months later, had shouldered a musket in the 
One Hundred and Sixteenth. His great heart was 
with the Union cause, and his only children able 
to bear arms were unhesitatingly given for its success. 
A band of guerillas between Dalton and Resaca 
wrecked the train, and all on board were made pris- 
oners. When aroused to the necessity of organizing 
a court and a police force, Mr. Rea was at once by 
acclamation selected as judge. A man named Mar- 
vin, said to have been a law student in Milwaukee, 
was chosen prosecuting attorney, and a red-headed 
shyster-like thief, who was regarded by many of us 
as a confederate of the muggers, volunteered to 
act as an attorney for the defence. A tall, black- 
haired, resolute athlete named Andrew Conn, a 
member of the Third Kentucky Cavalry Regiment, 
was chosen sheriff, and several others were appointed 



'' FUJENDS AT COURT:' 22 7 

to different offices connected with the court and 
police. 

The trial resulted in finding Thompson guilty of 
attempted robbery, and the court sentenced him to be 
chained each night to a large log of sawed, timber, in 
the prison, from sundown till sunrise. 

In a recent letter from Raymond, he states that 
Thompson was confined for a week or two ; that he 
by that time succeeded in sawing his chain in two, 
robbed a new-comer, and soon after went out of prison 
forever. Certain it is that Thompson had " friends at 
court," as several of the men who were on the police 
force were known to be in sympathy with the ruffians. 

In going out of the prison, it was doubtless for the 
purpose of enlisting in the Confederate Army. A 
man who was connected with Thompson was also 
tried and sentenced to wear for a time across his 
back a board having the word " thief" painted on it. 

Our court had frequent sessions until some time in 
the latter part of September or October, when a 
special change took place, in which Mr. Rea was 
included, when his departure, with several other cir- 
cumstances, led to its abandonment for a remedy 
equally good, which will be mentioned elsewhere. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

ANDREW J. CONN, THE SHERIFF A SKETCH OF HIM- 
SELF AND FAMILY PAT KELLY " PERRY " 

TOM HASSETT THE SPECIAL EXCHANGE. 

A FEW paragraphs should be devoted to the 
sheriff, Andrew Conn. His history, like that of 
many others confined with us, especially the men who 
came from the border slave States, was one of 
tragic interest. He was reared in Garrard County, 
Ky., and belonged to a family who were from the be- 
ginning pronounced Unionists. A story was current 
in prison that between the Conn family and another 
residina: in their neio"hborhood a feud, due to their 
differing political convictions, originated, which at 
length led to almost annihilation of both families. 
While that rumor was incorrect, it was true that the 
father and two brothers of Andrew were shot, the 
brothers dying almost instantly, the father living 
three or four years, his death in part due to his 
wound. 

In each case their wounds were received either in 
the defence and protection of the weak, or in an effort 



ANDREW J. CONN. 229 

to pacify a furious person, and in neither case were the 
victims the originators of or culpably concerned in 
the origin of the broils. 

Conn was a noble fellow in his dealings with all, 
with no bravado. Fear was an emotion he never expe- 
rienced. No man more competent for the position of 
sheriff could have been found in Cahaba, and so far as 
duties rested with him, they were faithfully performed ; 
but unfortunately several men were by some means 
appointed his lieutenants who were the boon com- 
panions of the muggers. 

When, in the latter part of October, three or four 
hundred men were sent away from Cahaba to the 
prison at Meridian, Miss., Conn was sent with them, 
and shortly after his arrival there with four others es- 
caped, was recaptured, escaped again, and reached the 
Union lines after several weeks. Ten or a dozen years 
later, while living in Madison County, Ky., he was 
assaulted by a drunken marauder, and to save his own 
life shot his assailant. The wounded man before his 
death exonerated Conn, and a grand jury fully acquit- 
ted him of any crime. 

Although Conn treated the parents of his assailant 
with marked kindness, even contributing to their phys- 
ical wants, the spirit of revenge lurked in their breasts, 
and less than a year after the son attempted his life, 
Conn was murdered by the father. 

Poor Conn ! that he deserved a better fate would be 



230 CAHABA. 

the involuntary expression of every honest man 
among our numbers who knew him. 

Besides the judge and sheriff, there were appointed 
a poHce force, the chief of which was Pat Kelly, a 
member of the Twelfth or Thirteenth Wisconsin In- 
fantry, and by report a deserter from the Fifth Lou- 
isiana Infantry, C. S. A. He was a vigorous, active, me- 
dium-sized, curly-haired, American-born Irishman, who, 
if not one of the worst of the muggers, certainly assisted 
them in every way possible, and never permitted a 
man known to have smuggled money into the prison 
to retain it for any length of time. In one squad of 
new prisoners was an Iowa man, a man who had been 
captured when in the service only a few months. He 
had been paid his monthly wages only a day or two 
before his capture, and had not been able to express 
his money home to his family. He had secreted about 
his person a fifty-dollar bill, and by some means the 
fact became known to one or two men with us, 
among whom was Pat Kelly. 

When the information was given to Kelly, my 
informant narrates that he manifested an uncom- 
mon interest. " Watch me t' night, me by," he ex- 
claimed ; "see me go through th' galoot;" and night 
had scarcely drawn its dark mantle over our abode 
of misery, when the poor Iowa countryman had 
been robbed of his treasure and knocked sprawling 
among a lot of sleeping comrades. Another objec- 



" perry:" 231 

tionable character was " Perry," a gross, flabby, red- 
headed, knock-kneed brute of a fellow, who had 
deserted from a Confederate regiment, and enlisted 
in the Third Kentucky Cavalry. He always had 
an abundance of money so long as new prisoners 
were sent to Castle Morgan. I thought it strange 
that he did not enlist in the Confederate Army in the 
winter of 1864 and 1865, when so many of his pals en- 
listed ; for at that time I was not aware that he was a de- 
serter ; but later facts made it evident. He deemed it 
far safer to remain in the dense crowd than to ex- 
pose himself to the risk of detection outside. When, 
in the spring of 1865, we were in Demopolis, Ala., 
going for exchange to Vicksburg, I noticed Perry 
among our numbers. No new prisoners had been 
sent to Cahaba for three or four months previous, and 
the exchequer of Perry had run low. His pants were 
badly frayed at the bottom, his knees were exposed 
through great holes, and a long rent extended through 
the seat from front to back, which his short, ragged 
blouse failed to conceal. While we were drawn up in 
line in the middle of the street waiting for orders, 
quite a body of the women of the place gathered on 
the sidewalk in front of us, and made many jeering 
remarks upon our mean and squalid appearance. 

Their tantalizing words fell upon the ears of Perry, 
and for once his vulgar instincts seemed to have 
found a legitimate field for manifesting themselves. 



232 CAHABA. 

Narrowly watching the guard, that his indecent act 
might not be observed by them, he feigned weariness, 
and half sat down. It was only a few moments when 
every tormentor there had observed him, and, with 
faces scarlet with anger and shame, they fled from 
the spot. 

Among our prisoners at Cahaba was a smooth- 
faced, handsome boy, a gun-boat man belonging to the 
monitor Chickasaw, who had been captured while on 
shore near Morganzie Bend, La. His eyes were 
large and full, his face round and ruddy, and his 
manner pleasant and captivating. A friend of the 
boy — a Kentuckian named Will Cayton — knowing 
the gullibility of Perry, and his infatuation for the 
society of ladies, imposed upon Perry, in strict confi- 
dence, the statement that the young gun-boat man was 
a girl in disguise, and for weeks the boy, who was 
informed of the fraud, was the recipient of numerous 
gifts and more numerous smiles from his uncouth 
admirer, his reticence and coyness when speaking 
with Perry only adding to the ardor of his suitor. 

While we were in Demopolis, at the time men- 
tioned above, Perry, although ragged, was not entirely 
penniless. Either by robbery or by gambling he had 
obtained enough of money to supply himself with the 
vile alcoholic liquor sold there, and, in company with 
one of the non-commissioned Confederate officers, 
had visited a drinking-room. Here, half crazed by 



TOM HASSETT. 233 

the " fire water," and emboldened by the fact that we 
were going on parole to our own lines, he became 
boisterous, and perhaps incautiously betrayed his 
identity ; certain it is, he attracted the attention of 
some Confederate officer before returning to our 
body. George W. Gulp, of Fawn, Kan., relates that 
shortly after his return to our men, then camping 
for the night in an old warehouse, while Gulp and 
Perry were standing conversing near the entrance 
of the building, a Gonfederate officer came to the 
door and addressed Perry, calling him not Perry, but 
Hogan. The officer ordered Perry to follow him. 

Twenty minutes later, after satisfying himself of 
his identity, Perry was shot dead by the Gonfederate, 
and his body kicked into the Tombigbee River. Two 
shots in quick succession were plainly heard by the 
men in the warehouse, and probably were those that 
sent the miserable wretch into eternity. Let us hope 
his existence beyond the dark river was not more sin- 
beclouded than while with us. Had he been recog- 
nized and executed months before it would have been 
a blessing to many of his victims in Gahaba. 

Tom Hassett was another individual prominent in 
the mugger gang. But little more than a boy in age, 
he was old in crime, loud in speech, utteily regard- 
less of the rights of others, cruel and savage in his 
assaults upon the weak, and treacherous and tiger-like 
in attacking his physical equals. He was hated and 



234 CAHABA. 

feared by nearly every respectable inmate of the 
prison. On one occasion an invalid was sent into 
the prison who was convalescing from a severe attack 
of erysipelas of the head and face ; weak and faint, 
he had just drawn his ration of the coarse meal, and 
was making preparation to cook it when Hassett 
snatched a large portion of it and walked away. 

Our sturdy, manly "judge," William Rea, chanced to 
observe the whole affair, and stepping forward, his face 
black with indignation, ordered the meal to be re- 
turned to the invalid. Hassett was not the person 
to cower before an ordinary man, and in a moment 
the two were engaged in a fierce fight. The con- 
valescent, ashamed to have an unknown stranger 
fighting his battles, approached the combatants, evi- 
dently with the intention of assisting Rea, when he 
was set upon by one of the pals of Hassett ; another 
prisoner, in attempting to save the invalid from harm, 
found himself assaulted by two or three muggers, and 
on these in turn several men from our number sprang 
like angry mastiffs. In two minutes from the time 
Rea determined to champion the cause of the weak 
man, a dozen or twenty men were pounding, kicking, 
biting, and bruising each other with all their power. 
My interest was chiefly for the victory of Rea, and to his 
struggle most attention was given. Hassett was the 
better pugilist — next after robbery that art had been 
his chief aim — but the Illinois citizen was a formid- 



WILLIAM RE A. 



235 



able adversary, and sent many a resounding blow and 
thump against the side and into the face of Hassett, 
and kicked him viciously in the side. When the 
affair was over, the bullying thief found himself much 
the " vv^orse for wear," and for many days went about 
stiffened and sore. 

The pen pictures of Perry, Kelly, and Hassett need 
only be duplicated to describe Pat Ponsonby, John 
Collins, Jack Mallett, and dozens of others whose 
names will be recalled with detestation by the sur- 
vivors of Castle Morgan. 

Mr. Rea was a fluent public speaker, and at all 
times ready to encourage the despondent and down- 
cast men who were his associates. On July 4th, 
shortly after his entrance into the prison, he deliv- 
ered a ringing speech that is remembered by every 
man there ; and several times after, when unfavorable 
news — rumors of the defeat of our army — was brought 
in to us, and many of our men were sad with the 
possibility, Mr. Rea would be called upon by those 
of us who loved to hear his strong, reasonable, patri- 
otic words. In conversation and in argument he was 
earnest, forcible, and quick to attack a weak point in 
the armor of an opponent, as is illustrated by an 
anecdote of him told by one who was captured at 
the same time and brought to Cahaba with him. 

A day or two after his capture the little band of 
Unionists were placed in charge of a Confederate 



236 CAHABA. 

guard commanded by a red-headed, red-whiskered, 
quick-tempered officer who deh'ghted to bully and 
badger his captives. Recognizing Rea as an out- 
spoken abolitionist (he was born and reared in 
Ohio), he ridiculed his regard for the rights of the 
negro, and asserted that " niggers were only a species 
of the baboon." A few minutes later he spoke of 
the kindly care extended to them and the paternal 
watchfulness of masters over their wards ; asserted 
there were many black boys on the plantation of 
his father whom he regarded almost like brothers. 
" Why," said he, " I have two children by a slave 
girl, and I'd kill any blank Yankee who would harm 
that girl or her pickaninnies." Hardly had the words 
passed his lips when Rea raised his hands in feigned 
astonishment — " What, lieutenant ! What, children by 
a baboon ! How could you !" For a moment the 
lieutenant was dumb ; then, conscious of the sharp 
ridicule he had merited, and unable to reply to the 
cutting words of his captive, he levelled his pistol 

at Rea, and exclaimed, " Shut up, you Yankee 

, or I'll blow you to h — in a minute." 

But the red-headed lieutenant avoided any further 
discussion with his citizen prisoner upon the subject 
of negroes. 

It was mentioned above that Mr. Rea owed his 
release from Castle Morgan to a special exchange ; 
and, to give a clearer idea of the causes that led to 



MILITARY OPERATIONS IN WEST TENNESSEE. 237 

this special exchange, it will be necessary to go back 
to the military operations of West Tennessee during 
the latter portion of the preceding summer. 

After the battle of Tupelo, Miss., in which the 
Confederate forces were defeated, the Union general, 
A. J. Smith, returned to Memphis, recruited his men 
for a few weeks, and, with a stronger force, was or- 
dered to hunt up the command of Forrest and engage 
it in battle. Forrest, however, planned differently ; 
knowing that the departure of the army under Smith 
from Memphis had weakened that post, he took three 
thousand picked troops and started toward it. The 
people of Mississippi were the friends of Forrest, and 
did not betray his movements to the Union troops. 
Forrest himself knew every mile of the country of 
Northern Mississippi and West Tennessee, especially 
in the vicinity of Memphis. He had been a slave- 
trader in Memphis before the war. The signboard 
of his slave market was at that time daily read by 
hundreds of Northern soldiers. With the advantage 
of friendly citizens, and an intimate knowledge of the 
locality, he approached Memphis without recognition 
on the morning of the 21st, just as day was break- 
ing; his troops rushed past the Union picket-posts, 
and before the Northern troops could be dressed 
and formed in line, he was in the heart of the city. 
His object was not to fight ; he had no intention 
or hope of permanently holding the place. His only 



238 CAHABA. 

object was to capture, if possible, General Washburn 
and his staff, and such others as could be seized, with 
little loss to himself. Another object was to pillage 
the stores of neutral and Northern merchants. His 
men came away loaded with plunder ; he captured 
several of Washburn's staff and a few score of others, 
and nearly succeeded in securing the person of Wash- 
burn himself. 

Immediately on entering the city a body of Con- 
federates hastened to the headquarters of Washburn. 
The Union . general had been awakened barely in 
time to escape from his sleeping-room, and the Con- 
federates carried away as trophies a suit of clothing 
belonging to him. 

Washburn had superseded General S. A. Hurlbut 
as commander of the Department of West Ten- 
nessee, and Hurlbut learned of the capture of his 
successor's wearing apparel with grim satisfaction. 

" I was removed from Memphis," said Hurlbut, 
" because I could not keep Forrest out of West Ten- 
nessee. The department commander who succeeded 
me could not keep Forrest out of his bedroom." 

The prisoners resulting from Forrest's Memphis 
raid were in Cahaba by September ist. Among 
them were the headquarter clerks and other at- 
taches of Washburn, the band of the Eighth Iowa 
Infantry, and a few non-commissioned officers, private 
citizens, etc. Washburn was anxious to have his 



EXCHANGING PRISONERS. 



239 



clerks back as early as possible, and at once began 
negotiations for their exchange. Several weeks 
passed, however, before arrangements for the ex- 
change were completed. Those weeks were the hal- 
cyon days of Castle Morgan. The band sang 
patriotic and sentimental songs nearly every night. 
Mr. Rea was with us, and often spoke words of cheer 
— the strong words born of knowledge and hope — to 
the men who were about him. Our captivity was 
yet so brief we had not learned its hopelessness. 
The summer's fierce, oven-like heat in the close 
stockade was passing away, and the cold, wet, shiv- 
ering days of winter had not yet arrived. The 
capacity of the old warehouse was estimated at 
five hundred to six hundred, and not more than 
double that number had yet been placed therein. 
Compared with a few weeks later, we had a super- 
abundance of room. 

Word came one day that probably the clerks of 
Washburn would be granted a special exchange ; 
four or five months previous I had been detailed for 
a short time, while our regiment was dismounted, 
as a clerk for Colonel Hepburn (now Member of 
Congress from Iowa). When the work of Hepburn 
was finished, I was urged by the chief clerk of Gen- 
eral Washburn to take his place as such. The able- 
bodied men who sought or accepted the positions 
of luxury and safety to be found about military 



240 CAHABA. 

camps were regarded by the " men in the trenches" 
as effeminate and sadly wanting in the nobler quali- 
ties of manhood. By few was this view accepted 
with less question than by me, and the " soft place at 
headquarters" was declined. The possibility of a re- 
lease from Castle Morgan even at that early period 
was a matter to be much dwelt upon ; but dwelling 
upon the matter brought only the reflection, " It 
might have been ;" and we saw the clerks go forth 
from the prison with little change in our views 
regarding the able-bodied men who sought or ac- 
cepted a position that enabled them to " loaf around 
the throne." 

The exchange was not confined entirely to head- 
quarter clerks. Some men who had been captured 
elsewhere were so fortunate as to be enumerated 
in the list called out for passage to our lines, and 
among these were Mr. Rea and Henry St. John, 
the old gentleman named elsewhere. 

St. John had gone South to recover the body of a 
widow's son, and was captured and held as a hostage 
for Southern citizens in Northern prisons. Both Cap- 
tain Henderson, the Commissioner of Exchange, and 
Mr. St. John were members of the Masonic fraternity. 
One day Captain Henderson entered the prison, 
when St. John arrested his attention, and gave the 
hailing sign of distress. 

Among the friends of Captain Henderson confined 



CAPT. SHARP AND HENRY ST. JOHN. 24 1 

in Northern prisons was a Captain Sharp of a Georgia 
miUtia company, at that time held at Camp Chase, O. 
Henderson proposed to St. John that an exchange of 
Captain Sharp for St. John be effected, and took him 
to Memphis with the understanding that he should 
be given forty days to bring about such an exchange; 
but should he fail to secure the release of Sharp, 
he must return to Memphis and deliver himself again 
into the hands of the Confederates. This arrange- 
ment between Henderson and St. John was approved 
by General Washburn, and adding his Masonic oath 
to his parole of honor, St. John hastened northward. 
His first stopping-place was at Camp Chase, where 
he acquainted Captain Sharp of the efforts to be 
made for his release, and where he hoped the 
transaction could be effected speedily. Here his 
efforts were futile ; then he went to Washington and 
besieged that stanch patriot, that fiery-tempered man 
whose anxiety for the maintenance of the Union 
and whose confidence in his own opinion and ability 
was so great that he would, if possible, have carried 
on the war entirely alone, that human " bear with 
a sore head," Secretary Stanton. Here, too, as was to 
be expected, he failed. Then, after three weeks of 
delay, he was permitted to appeal personally to the 
soft heart in " Father Abraham's" bosom, and, as 
was to be expected, he succeeded. When the forty 

days had nearly passed, Colonel Henderson found his 
16 



242 CAHABA. 

friend Sharp at Black River, near Vicksburg, com- 
fortably clothed, and his passage paid by St. John. 

A son of William Rea informs me that he secured 
his liberty only by bribing one of the Confederate 
officers. To the Confederate officer he gave all the 
ready cash he could spare from his own purse and all 
he could borrow from the pauper crowd with which 
he was associated. In addition to this, he promised 
to deed to the officer's wife, then residing in West- 
ern Kentucky, three hundred and twenty acres of 
his land. For his release also two Confederates were 
to be sent South. When Rea arrived in Memphis 
General Burbridge told him the two men surrendered 
for him were persons very much desired by the Con- 
federates, and very reluctantly given up by the Fed- 
erals on account of their objectionable history. 

Rea was recognized as a strong man, admired, 
loved fervently by his political friends, and hated by 
his political adversaries. 

Reaching his home near Decatur, III, a few days 
after his release, he was requested to deliver an 
address in Power's Hall in that city. His utterances 
upon that occasion are recalled by the old residents 
of Decatur as among the most thrillingly patriotic 
of the many remembered through the long period 
that has since elapsed. 

It may interest the survivors of Cahaba to know 
that our stanch companion met with his death 



DEATH OF MR. RE A. 243 

in 1878 as the result of an accident. While riding 
a stumbling horse, horse and rider were thrown to 
the ground. In the fall he was severely stunned by 
striking upon his head. For a few days he pursued 
his usual business, complaining at all times of an 
uncomfortable headache. He at length decided to 
consult his family physician, and while stepping 
from a car on his way to his medical attendant, 
clapped his hand to his forehead, and exclaiming 
to some friends with whom he had been in delightful 
conversation for the previous half hour, "Oh, my God, 
gentlemen — " fell before the sentence was finished, 
and was dead in a few minutes. 

Among those who were so fortunate as to be 
enumerated in this special exchange was a young 
man captured at Memphis during the raid of General 
Forrest, named Pope. He went with his comrades 
as far as Jackson, Miss., where he was taken sick, died, 
and was buried. His father, a fairly well-to-do citizen 
of Quincy, III, set on foot measures to recover his 
body. From our own officials he received the prom- 
ise of an ambulance, and from Confederate authorities 
he was promised the ordinary courtesies of a civilian 
engaged in such an undertaking. A young man 
named Ira Pitney, a friend of the father, was just 
ready to start from Vicksburg for Jackson, when the 
Confederate agent of exchange, Colonel Watts, who 
had previously assured them of his consent and 



244 CAHABA. 

assistance, demanded and received five hundred dol- 
lars before Pitney could enter Confederate territory. 
A draft was made on the father through a Vicksburg 
bank, and this was paid by the father of young Pope. 
(From Report of Congressional Committee.) 

The departure of Mr. Rea interrupted the sessions 
of our court ; but as the " mugger" element among our 
police in a measure neutralized the power of the 
"judge," the abolition of the court was not deeply 
felt. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

A NEW ARBITER A DESIRABLE AUTOCRAT " BIG 

TENNESSEE " HIS COLLISION WITH THE MUGGERS 

A THORN IN THEIR FLESH. 

WE were not left long, however, without a 
remedy for our ills and evils. While we 
were considering how best to secure justice in spite 
of Pat Kelly's crew and the manifest advantage 
they possessed as the recognized police force, sev- 
eral hundred new prisoners were brought in, among 
whom was a Tennesseean of enormous size and 
power. 

When the rebel General Hood started North from 
Atlanta, he encountered Union troops at several 
places, and at some unimportant post succeeded in 
capturing the Third Tennessee Cavalry Regiment, to 
which our young giant belonged. 

The mugging outrage was carried out with these 
men as with so many others. But one of the men 
who had been robbed remembered those who had 
garroted him, and on the following morning singled 
them out and went for his gigantic friend — " Big 
Tennessee " was the name we bestowed upon him. 



246 CAHABA. 

His true name was George Pierce. In height he 
was as near seven feet as six ; his arms seemed a foot 
longer than those of an ordinary sized man, and 
were large, muscular, and hard. His chest and 
shoulders were enormous, even for a man of his 
gigantic dimensions. The muscles of his neck 
brought to mind old pictures of gladiators. But 
with all his physical power, his manner was that of 
one of the mildest of men. Indeed, he seemed an 
overgrown boy, who would be too timid to defend 
his own rights, let alone the possibility of being the 
champion of the rights of others. Such an opinion 
the muggers formed of him. 

The young man who had been so roughly han- 
dled the preceding night returned to his assailants 
and demanded the return of this property. With 
an air of injured innocence they denied having ever 
seen him before, and, on being pressed further, threat- 
ened to punish him if he did not go away. 

Then " Tennessee " approached nearer, apparently 
as a mere spectator who, in passing, had for the first 
time heard of any disagreement. As their words 
became hotter, he mildly took sides with the new- 
comer. Of the muggers there were three or four 
ready to assist each other, and they were only waiting 
a moment that in concert they might the more easily 
inflict brutal punishment upon the man who would 
dare to accuse them of being robbers. 



"BIG Tennessee:' 247 

If they surround him who sought redress, he is as 
helpless as a child. One will give him from behind a 
stunning blow, and ere he can recover from its effects, 
another will kick his feet from under him, another will 
jump with rough boots upon his upturned face, and in 
a moment he is senseless from the brutal blows and 
kicks of these men — these fiends. 

The words of " Tennessee " are interpreted by them 
as a meddlinor with their affairs that cannot and will 
not be tolerated. They look up and see a tall, gawky, 
mild-looking, overgrown boy. They have been the 
thugs and shoulder-hitters of a great city. There they 
have learned that great odds are in favor of him who 
has given his adversary an unexpected, staggering blow. 
Springing with the quickness of a tiger, hissing out, 
" D — n you, take that for your meddling with what 
is none of your business," one of the rascals struck 
with all his power at the neck of "Tennessee," while 
another aimed a blow at his left side. 

Neither blow went where intended. They had 
counted him a green country boy, who could be sent 
sprawling upon the earth with the bellow of an in- 
jured calf. He was a mountain lion in human form — 
an athlete who could deal with these men as with 
little children. 

When he found himself beset so savagely, with the 
quickness of a flash his left hand flew backward and 
one assailant fell quivering to the earth, nearly knock- 



248 CAHABA. 

ing over some men standing behind him. His brawny 
right fist, Hke the kick of a fiery horse, was sent into 
the face of Number 2, and he was senseless for many 
minutes, and bruised and mangled for weeks. 

Two others were before him ; he caught each by 
his long hair, and after bumping their heads together 
a moment, lifted them bodily from the ground, slam- 
med them together with great violence, and flung 
them at full length upon the earth. 

There was no " fight" left in the gentlemen he had 
so roughly handled. Sick, faint from the terrible 
shock each had received, they slow^ly arose and walked 
away, or were assisted to depart by their confederates. 
None others offered to give him battle. Those who 
had seen the evidence of his prowess would as soon 
attack a catapult or an enraged elephant. 

In a few minutes " Big Tennessee " relapsed into 
the awkward, good-natured boy, and, with his friend, 
returned to his part of the prison. 

A change came over the muggers. From being a 
gang of abusive, bullying, brutal thugs, they changed 
to a glowering set of rascals, who, when the name of 
" Bis" Tennessee " was mentioned, had little desire to 
boldly appropriate the scant property of their fellow- 
prisoners. 

In an hour half the boys in the prison had 
heard that " Tennessee " had whipped some of the 
muggers. Many who had not heard the particulars 



"MUGGERS" AFRAID OF "BIG TENNESSEE." 



249 



felt that the reign of terror was at an end, and 
from that time forward if any bully was inclined to 
invade the rights of his fellow, the wronged person 
had only to convince our giant of the justice of his 
cause, when, with no fuss and few words, his wrongs 
were righted, if it were possible for them to be. 

On one occasion I sought the good offices of our 
common friend for a poor sick Ohio boy who had 
been robbed of his wood by a pirate. I had noticed 
the sick fellow trying to cook some mush from 
the coarse corn-meal. He left his little fire for a 
short time to go to another part of the prison, 
and on his return the little pile of wood he had 
left had been carried away by a brawny brute who, 
however, had been observed by another near by. 
The invalid, on his return, asked what had become 
of his wood, and learned who the thief was. He 
wanted to know of him why he had taken it away, 
and was, with an oath, told to " get away or he 
would mash him." I called the sick boy to me, 
and told him to wait until I could bring " Big 
Tennessee." "Tennessee" was cooking his breakfast 
at the time, but willingly went with me. In company 
with the emaciated, scrawny Ohioan, " Tennessee " 
walked up to the pirate and said, " You have taken 
this sick boy's wood ; give it back to him." 

" I haven't seen any of his wood. The wood I 
got over there belonged to one of my chums." 



250 CAHABA. 

" Look here, we don't want any trouble here. 
Here, Ohio, pick up your wood and take it back." 
At the same moment our peacemaker placed his 
enormous hand on the shoulder of the thief. The 
latter looked as though he could commit a murder 
with half an opportunity, but did not stir to pre- 
vent the boy taking the wood. The " strong arm of 
the law " was near at hand. 

When " Ohio " had returned to his mush, " Tennes- 
see " turned his puny antagonist half way round, and 
remarked, " It will be very unhealthy for you to 
try on any more such little tricks." This senten- 
tious advice was all that Pierce usually deemed 
necessary to give. 

At another time some of Pat Kelly's friends ill 
used a poor fellow who had not been able to get 
up from his little nest in the sand. To give the 
color of reason for having abused the boy, they 
asserted that he was dirty and lousy, and should 
be washed then and there. The invalid could 
scarcely stand ; to be sure, he was dirty and lousy ; 
so was every one else there. They dragged him to 
the water, and though the day was cold and cloudy 
in late fall, they took sand and cold water and 
began to scrub him, at the same time tearing off 
his scanty rags. 

Immediately " Tennessee " was called. Coming up 
to Pat Kelly, who was by this time one of the 



SAD END OF AN INVALID. 25 I 

chief actors in the scene, he said, " Mr. Kelly, you 
can't abuse that boy ; don't you interfere with him 
any more. Boy, put on your clothes and go back 
to your bed if you want to." That was enough. 
Pat Kelly " let himself down " as best he could, 
and the invalid returned to his burrow. 

" Tennessee " never had but the one fight while 
in prison ; that was so decisive that further demon- 
strations of his muscle were never desired ; and 
thereafter no mugger ever wished to go contrary 
to his command or suo^aestion. When we were 
ordered into the south end of the prison to be 
counted the next morning, a Kentucky boy whose 
nest was by the side of the invalid told me he 
had died during the night. " He would have died 
in a day or two, I guess, but the sand and cold 
water didn't help him any." 

Shortly after the Presidential election, in No- 
vember, special efforts were made by the Confeder- 
ates to enlist men from our numbers, and at that 
time nearly all of the worst muggers went out of 
the stockade into the Confederate service. 

It w^as the opinion of many good observers that 
the influence of " Big Tennessee " made a longer 
stay in his presence most hateful to them. Pierce 
probably lost his life by the explosion of the Sul- 
tana. 



CHAPTER XX. 

COLONEL HOWARD HENDERSON, THE COMMISSIONER 
OF EXCHANGE COLONEL SAMUEL JONES, COM- 
MANDER OF THE PRISON A COWARD AT VICKS- 

BURG — CASHIERED AND SENT TO CAHABA TO 
COMMAND CASTLE MORGAN. 

IN these memoirs of Cahaba a prominent place 
should be given to Captain (later Colonel) 
Howard A. M. Henderson. 

Colonel Henderson entered the Confederate ser- 
vice, from Kentucky, as a captain of the Colonel 
Clay Cadets. For a time he was in field service, 
then was sent to take charge of the prison at Cahaba. 
Here he was promoted, and appointed Assistant Com- 
missioner for the Exchange of Prisoners of War, and 
assigned to duty for the Department of Alabama, 
Mississippi, and East Louisiana. He had charge of 
the prisoners at Opelika, Macon, Cahaba, Selma, 
Meridian, and Enterprise, Miss. The relations of 
Henderson with the officers of the Union Army, 
as an officer connected with the exchange of pris- 
oners, were often intimate and cordial, and by many 



DOUBTFUL STATEMENTS. 253 

of the non-commissioned officers and privates he is 
remembered with kindly wishes. That he, however, 
was only human is evident to all prisoners who ever 
read an article written by him on the relative death- 
rate of captives in Northern and Confederate prisons. 
In the article referred to, we are told that many great 
hospitals in time of peace could duplicate the pictures 
of the men sent North from Confederate prisons, and 
this, too, where the patients have had the best of care. 
This is a mode of reasoning that may properly be 
called sophistry. It would have us infer that pris- 
oners in the Confederate "pens" were as tenderly 
cared for as patients in great metropolitan hospitals 
in time of peace. 

A very fair hospital was said to have been in 
Cahaba. This statement is not doubted; but even 
as early as October, 1864, when our prison was less 
crowded than later, the Confederate surgeon in charge 
complains of the number of "wounded and very sick 
prisoners confined in the stockade because there was 
no room for them elsewhere." (See Report D. T. 
Chandler, Lieutenant-Colonel C. S. A., in Congres- 
sional Report on Treatment of Prisoners.) 

In the same article are other statements which 
any person well informed upon the subject will 
challenge, but the many kindly deeds performed by 
Colonel Henderson for Federals forefends him in 
the matter. 



254 



CAHABA. 



When the forces of Forrest dashed into Memphis 
in August, 1864, and narrowly missing General Wash- 
burn, seized upon his uniform and watch, these 
articles were recovered from the captor, and, through 
Colonel Henderson, returned to their original pro- 
prietor. To return the courtesy, the staff officers of 
Washburn sent to Colonel Henderson a fine uniform; 
and at the close of the war General Washburn gave 
to the Confederate Officer of Exchange a certificate 
of his courtesy and kindness to Federal captives. 

It was often in the power of Henderson to extend 
kindnesses and courtesies to prisoners, and we are 
glad to note that the opportunity was not infre- 
quently embraced. On one occasion Spaulding, a 
lieutenant-colonel of an Ohio regiment, resigned from 
military service and became a cotton speculator. As 
such he was captured and carried to Cahaba. In 
his young manhood Colonel Henderson had been 
a student at Delaware, O. (Ohio Wesleyan Uni- 
versity), where Spaulding had also studied at the 
same time. Recognizing Spaulding as a classmate 
in other years, he took him to his home in Cahaba, 
and much ameliorated his condition from that of the 
average paroled prisoner. At length, revealing his 
identity to his captive, he arranged for his exchange, 
and also for the exchange of a younger brother, who 
was in Castle Morgan. The two brothers were sons 
of the Hon. Z. Spaulding, at that time a Member of 



COLONEL HENDERSON. 255 

Congress from the Cleveland, O., district. As soon 
as the war had ended Congressman Spaulding, grate- 
ful for the service rendered him in the release of his 
sons, secured the passage of an amnesty bill relieving 
Colonel Henderson of all political disabilities. 

Another incident illustrating the pleasant relations 
of Colonel Henderson with the officers of our army 
is recalled in the case of Captain Poe. Poe, a de- 
scendant of the famous Indian fighter and pioneer, 
a giant in size, was captured, with others, at Sul- 
phur Trestle, Tenn., and carried to Enterprise, Miss. 
When arrangements had been made for the ex- 
change of this body of officers they left Enter- 
prise and started toward Memphis. On the first 
night of the journey the captives, with Colonel Hen- 
derson, stopped at Canton, Miss. The feet of Poe 
were naked and in such a condition as to render 
locomotion almost impossible, unless some protec- 
tion for them could be obtained. On the way to 
Canton, Henderson had become interested in the 
huge Yankee, partially on account of his ancestor, 
and soon after their arrival at Canton the Confed- 
erate colonel asked his gigantic prisoner to go with 
him, as he wished to present him with a pair of shoes. 
The feet of the captain were not smaller in propor- 
tion than his body, and, after searching several stores, 
only a pair of plantation brogans (russets) could be 
found large enough to encase his " foundations." 



256 CAHABA. 

Large as were the russets, their price was larger, and 
three hundred and sixty dollars in depreciated Con- 
federate scrip was paid by Henderson for them. 

On the arrival of the grateful captive in Memphis 
he asked and received permission of the post com- 
mander to take the colonel about town for a short 
time. His first visit was to a clothing house, where 
he compelled his new friend to accept of a fine black 
military overcoat as a token of his esteem. 

Among the men who were paroled and permitted 
to remain outside of the prison was a soldier of a 
New England regiment, whose trade was that of 
carriage-maker. At odd hours he constructed for 
the little daughter of Colonel Henderson — a little 
tot, who was much petted by our men " outside "— ^ 
a miniature carriage. The gift brought a better 
acquaintance between the exchange commissioner 
and the captive, and, at a later period, the prisoner 
besought the colonel to favor his exchange at an 
early period. He was suffering severely from chronic 
diarrhoea and dysentery ; he urged that his health was 
poor and growing worse ; that if he remained for a 
long period in the custody of the Confederates, and 
under his existing anxiety, he feared his life would 
be soon cut short. A wife and a small family of 
children were waiting and tearfully watching for him 
in his cosey little New England home. 

His pleadings were not in vain ; and, though con- 



COLONEL HENDERSON'S KLNDA'ESS. 257 

trary to the advice of physicians and friends, who 
feared he would not be able to accomplish the foot 
journey that must be made by all prisoners between 
Jackson and Black River Bridge, he started for our 
lines with the next squad of exchanged prisoners. The 
stimulus of hope enabled him to endure the journey 
by rail to Jackson, but he had not marched with his 
comrades an hour before weakness prohibited his fur- 
ther progress on foot. An ambulance accompanied 
the train, and by the order of Colonel Henderson he 
was placed in this. Large armies of Confederates 
and Northern men had in previous years been en. 
camped near the Black River Bridge, twelve miles 
east of Vicksburg, and had cut down and cleared 
away all timber for two or three miles on either side 
of the river. Before the little band of prisoners had 
reached the cleared space the sick man, overcome by 
the fatigue of the long journey, passed into a state of 
coma. Learning this, Colonel Henderson gave his 
horse to a footman and rode in the ambulance by 
the form of the insensible man. 

On the western side of the river, upon the high 
bluff, and plainly visible for a long distance, a camp 
of Union soldiers was stationed. From a tall flag- 
staff at the camp headquarters the " Stars and Stripes " 
floated upon the gentle breeze, and was espied by the 
returning prisoners as they entered the eastern side 
of the clearing. No man knows how thrilling is 
17 



i258 CAHABA. 

that siofht until he has viewed it under the circum- 
stances of these men. Cheer upon cheer burst from 
their lips, and tears of stron^rest emotion coursed 
down their cheeks ; even the unconscious man, borne 
in the ambulance, was aroused by the cheers and 
shouts of his comrades. Turning to Henderson, he 
asked the cause of the sudden commotion, and was 
kindly informed of his proximity to his own army. 
" Raise me up, please," he said ; " I want to see our 
beautiful flae." The Confederate colonel raised him 
to a reclining position, and supported his head upon 
his own breast. Gazing intently for a moment, he 
murmured, " Thank God ! I shall see my dear wife 
and babies again." A moment later he grew ashy 
pale, and sank lifeless into the arms of the Confed- 
erate, down whose cheeks the tears of sorrow and 
sympathy flowed as uncontrollably as at the death 
of a comrade. "One touch of nature" made these 
men kin. 

Turnino- from Colonel Henderson to Lieutenant- 
Colonel Samuel Jones, Twenty-second Louisiana In- 
fantry, who was in command of the prison during the 
greater portion of the last year of its existence, we 
find one whose record was a sickening blotch upon 
humanity. Before the war he was a bookkeeper in a 
large New Orleans wholesale house, and remained 
there until conscription forced into the Confederate 
States Army every available man between the ages of 



LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JONES. 259 

childhood and senility ; then he obtained an officer's 
commission, and was in due time sent to the army at 
Vicksburg. 

It was rumored among our men who were so un- 
fortunate as to have been placed in his power that 
his cruelty was in some manner connected with his 
having deserted from the old United States Army. 
The rumor had no good foundation. He was 
never in the United States Army. At Vicks- 
burg (a Confederate who knew him well informs 
me) he was guilty of the grossest cowardice, and 
from there was sent to command the prison at 
Cahaba as a cashiered officer. By what strange and 
malignant destiny, if there was no method in it, were 
cowards and cruel men so often placed in charge of 
the prisons for Federal captives — Winder, Beewet, 
Wirtz, Turner, Fitzpatrick, Jones.? 

The relations between Jones and Henderson were 
never cordial, and at times were quite unfriendly. It 
was urged by one or two of the guards that Jones 
when not drunk was less brutal than he would ordi- 
narily seem ; but, unfortunately for the poor wretches 
whose very lives depended upon his moods, he was 
never seen by us except when intoxicated. 

A son of Colonel Jones was at Cahaba a portion 
of the time, a captain in the Confederate service. I 
am told by a Confederate that the son at times ex- 
pressed a dissatisfaction with the course pursued by 



26o CAHABA. 

the parent. A regard for the law of atavism might 
well make him solicitous. 

To J. H. Morrison, of the Seventh Wisconsin 
Battery, he remarked one day, " You d — Yankees 
will get enough of this kind of existence before you 
get out. If I could have my own way I would hang 
every devil of you." 

To another prisoner, who was detailed to bury a 
comrade, he growled out, " I'm only sorry the d — 
blue-bellies are so tough — they don't die fast enough ;" 
and to the writer of this on one occasion his words 
were even more cruel. 

Jones was always hated and feared by the captives, 
and was never known to show any pity or compassion 
to the abject men who were under the iron heel of 
his authority. 

A rumor has gained credence among ex-Cahabans 
that after the close of the war, when the arrest of poor 
little cowardly Wirz was made public, Jones in dis- 
guise fled from the United States and remained away 
for several years ; then, believing, from facts that came 
to his knowledge, that no punishment for his crimes 
would be given, he returned to New Orleans, where, 
if he has not, within two or three years, been called 
to the tortures of another world to be punished for 
the tortures he inflicted upon others in this, he is 
still living. 



CHAPTER XXL 

THE GUARDS AT CASTLE MORGAN THE MODERN RIVER 

STYX — THE author's LIFE SPARED BY AN OLD 

CONSCRIPT HANKINS PIE KILLS THREE MEN IN 

SIX DAYS "LITTLE CHARLEY " MRS. AMANDA 

GARDNER. 

THE guards on duty at Castle Morgan were 
largely conscripts. In October, 1864, they con- 
sisted of the trans-Mississippi battalion, two companies 
Alabama reserves, infantry, one company Alabama 
reserves, cavalry, eighteen men detailed from some 
other portion of the Confederate States Army, and 
two or more brass field-pieces (Napoleon guns). 

The older men among the guards were perhaps as 
humane as need be expected, and several certainly 
were so. An atmosphere of sad seriousness enveloped 
the. majority of these more kindly older men, and one 
could but feel they were depressed by forebodings 
and homesickness. 

The first night I was in Castle Morgan (we 
first entered it long after nightfall), while seeking a 
place on the ground where I could lie down, I 



262 CAHABA. 

unconsciously stood for several moments upon the 
" beat " of one of the guards stationed inside the 
prison. The light from the guard fire, several rods 
away, was extremely dim. The sentinel had been 
stationary before I came near his beat, and to a 
stranger in the place, as I was, there was nothing 
to indicate the existence of a dead line. Nearly 
all of those who slept on the ground in that part of 
the prison had laid down and were wrapt in slum- 
ber, or were courting the drowsy god. Standing 
contemplating the prospect for a moment, I felt a 
hand respectfully placed upon my shoulder, and 
turned to interrogate the intruder. A man past 
middle age stood before me dressed in " butternut," 
his gun thrown over his shoulder ; he possessed about 
as much of military bearing as an average small 
farmer whose squirrel hunt had not been successful. 
Pointing to the cleared space upon which I was 
standing, he explained, " You are over the dead line, 
sir ; you mustn't stand here ; 'tis against our orders." 
I excused myself, and explained that I had just been 
turned in that night, and had not yet become acquaint- 
ed with the place. The phrase, " Over the dead line," 
was quite unfamiliar to us recent captives, and had 
not yet burned and blistered its terrible meaning 
upon our intellects ; we had not yet learned that the 
" dead line " was to prisoners a modern river Styx, 
from across which none returned with life ; but in after 



THE DEAD LINE, 263 

months, as I saw how quickly men were despatched 
for the same mistake, I always considered my life to 
have been spared by the old man's humanity. Several 
instances of this character are recalled with pleasure 
by the men who were witnesses of them. 

It were much more pleasant if a truthful history of 
Castle Morgan could show no wretched contrasts to 
the incident given above ; but in this particular the 
Alabama pen differed little from its kind elsewhere. 

The first murder that fell under the observation of 
the author after entering the place was the killing of 
an inoffensive German who came into the prison a 
few days after our recapture in August. The German, 
who had left his small farm and home and little 
family in Wisconsin to battle for his adopted State 
(how devoted w^ere the Teutons to the Union cause !) 
Iiad arrived in Cahaba late the previous evening, and 
had been without supper that night or breakfast the 
following morning. By the middle of the forenoon 
he was extremely hungry. He had drawn his ration 
of meal, and was waiting to borrow a "skillet" in 
which to cook it. Although I was within a few feet 
of the German at the moment of the shooting and 
previous, I was not aware of the circumstances con- 
nected with it previous to the shooting, until they 
were narrated to me by a comrade who had personally 
observed them. That one might be within a short 
distance of such a tragedy before its enactment and 



264 CAHABA. 

be unconscious of its antecedents is not remarkable 
when it is remembered that probably two hundred 
men were within a radius of a hundred feet of us. 

The comrade who had been a witness of the deed 
stated that the German, after receiving his ration of 
meal, in broken English asked a guard where he 
could get wood to cook it. Near the stockade, on 
the danger side of the dead line, a stick of wood had 
fallen, and none of the prisoners had cared to attempt 
its removal. To this stick of wood the guard called 
the attention of the hungry man, and said, " There 
is wood." The new arrival, unconscious of doing 
anything that jeopardized his life, at once put a foot 
over the dead line, and leaned forward, with his back 
to the guard, to reach the wood. Only one foot was 
over the dead line, and to the guard it was evident 
that the man was a recent comer, unused to the rules 
of the prison, and unconscious of transgressing any 
of them. What the harmless fellow intended or did 
not intend was nothing to the blood-thirsty brute. 
He only saw a technical excuse for killing a Yankee. 

In a moment his gun was at his shoulder and a 
bullet went crashing through the leg of the German, 
near the knee. All jumped away — another guard 
might fire into the crowd. The German lay groaning 
and bleeding upon the ground, the blood spurting 
from the opening. 

After a few moments, when it was quite certain 



HAN KINS. 



265 



that no more shots would be fired, I asked the guard 
if I might go to the German and stop the loss of 
blood. He gave a tardy assent, and asking him again 
not to shoot me, I went to the prostrate man, and 
taking off the belt from about my waist, twisted it 
tightly around his limb, and arrested the flow of blood. 
We took him out to the hospital, but a few days later 
he was laid in the ground. 

One of the most savage rascals we had to guard 
us was a murderer named Hankins. One day a 
boyish soldier named "Teddy," a member of the 
Third Michigan Cavalry, made an arrangement with 
Hankins to bring him in a few sweet potatoes when 
next he should come on guard. Hankins was 
stationed that day near the gateway between the 
cook-yard and the sleeping-yard. As sometimes 
many persons collected at this gateway and im- 
peded the passage of persons from one yard to the 
other, orders were given prohibiting persons from 
gathering in the gateway. The order was well 
enough, and was intended to prevent any crowd 
from obstructing the passage. 

Teddy approached Hankins when he came on 
guard again, and from him received and paid for 
his sweet potatoes. Starting to go into the sleeping- 
yard, he had just got into the gateway when some friend 
hailed him from the outside ; without thinking where 
he was, he stopped for a moment and looked around. 



266 CAHABA. 

That was an opportunity Hankins had wanted; the 
face of his intended victim was turned away, and no 
comrade saw the danger in time to warn the boy. 
Raising his musket quickly to his shoulder, a big 
bullet was sent crashing through his body, and Teddy 
fell to the earth. 

The wound was not immediately fatal. Some of 
his friends were at length permitted to go to him 
and carry him away. I was standing on the inside 
of the gateway as friends with tender hands bore 
him out to the hospital. The only words I heard 
him utter as he was borne past me were, " Boys, when 
you get away from here remember this." In two days 
Teddy was where the bullet of an assassin could do 
him no harm. 

Two days after, in the same place, Hankins killed 
another man with whom but a few moments before 
he had been in pleasant conversation, and with whom 
he had not passed an unpleasant word. 

In six days of that single week Hankins killed 
three men, and in each case there was not the least 
shadow of reason or excuse for the murders. By an 
Iowa acquaintance I am informed that "when Gen- 
eral Wilson's cavalry captured Cahaba some of his 
men, who had formerly been in Cahaba prison and 
knew of the kindness of Mrs. Gardner toward the 
prisoners there, requested to be allowed to go ahead 
and surround Mrs. Gardner's house, to protect it and 



''LITTLE CHARLEY:' 267 

its inmates. They also intended to capture and burn 
Hankins at the stake ; but on their arrival Mrs. Gard- 
ner told them that Hankins was taken sick and died 
a natural death in Cahaba after the prisoners left." 

Another assassin was " Little Charley " — Charles 
Tate — a boy of sixteen years, perhaps. I was stand- 
ing in the cook-yard, near the northwest corner, one 
morning, and Charley was on guard near by, on 
top of the stockade. An Iowa boy was cooking his 
breakfast of meal just west of me, and nearer the 
dead line. I was between Charley and the Iowa boy. 
Suddenly a prisoner near me, who had looked up, 
sprang away ; in the same instant the report of a gun 
and the whiz of a passing bullet was heard. The 
Iowa boy fell where he was standing; a bullet had 
passed through his body, and from thence into the 
ground. 

As soon as we dared we went to the fallen sufferer, 
and bore him to the place where he had been accus- 
tomed to sleep on the ground. Before he was moved 
some one asked him if he was over the dead line, and 
he answered, " No ; I was at least three feet inside." 
We looked where the bullet had struck the ground, 
and found that two feet inside the dead line, toward 
the prison's cook-yard, even after passing through^ the 
soldier. The murdered boy must have been more 
than four feet away from the nominal line of danger. 

At another time several scores of men were stand- 



268 CAHABA. 

ing in line near the gate, expecting to go outside the 
stockade for wood ; one man in the line for some 
cause leaned sideways and extended his head outside 
the line of the column ; he was giving no heed to 
Charley, whose post was near the head of the line ; 
he had no cause to expect danger, as he had trans- 
gressed no order — had not overstepped the dead line ; 
but his position arrested the attention of the little 
murderer, and in a moment his gun flashed at the 
leaning man. The eagerness of the boy to do his 
deadly work had made his aim imperfect, and the 
bullet, missing the intended victim, buried itself in 
the man behind him, and another was added to his 
list of murders. 

Comrade Henry J. Kline, of Mill Grove, Ind., 
and others allege seeing " Little Charley" bayonet a 
prisoner who was passing between the cook-yard and 
the sleeping-yard. On that occasion two men going 
in opposite directions met in the gateway ; one was 
carrying in a little pail of mush, the other was bringing 
out from the water barrels a cup of water. In at- 
tempting to pass each other, both turned to the same 
side, and stood still for a second. Perceiving them 
motionless for the moment, though the cause was 
easily apparent, the blood-thirsty guard drove his bay- 
onet with all possible force through the body of the 
nearest prisoner, who in a moment was lifeless on 
the earth before him. How many in all Charley 



CHARLEY'S "ZEAL" REWARDED. 269 

killed I do not know, but I am certain of his killing 
three. 

One day I was talking with an old conscript, who 
was strongly suspected of being almost a Union man 
by some of us who had talked with him. I had been 
told that Charley had been granted a furlough for his 
"zeal as a guard" — that is what the Confederates 
called it. In reply to my question whether Charley 
was away on furlough or not, he replied in the affirm- 
ative. " Why was he furloughed .?"j I asked. " I don't 
know," he replied, " but I heered 'twas because he was 
such a good soldier." " Well, say, uncle," I continued, 
" was he given a furlough because he killed so many 
prisoners ?" " I guess so," said he ; " that's what we 
uns allers heered ;" and if I were to make oath to the 
probable truth of the statement, I certainly would 
state I believed Charley was furloughed becaiise he 
had been esteemed a most vigilant guard, as was evi- 
denced by his murderous activity. 

I sometimes hear persons state that the stories of 
Southern prisons must be overdrawn. I read, some 
time since, " Andersonville," by John McElroy, late of 
Company L, Sixteenth Illinois Cavalry, and persons 
who have read that work have said they could not 
believe all its statements. I wish here to bear testi- 
mony that, though I read the above work with the 
utmost care, I read nothing that was more remarkable 
than what I myself have often seen or had directly 



270 CAN ABA. 

from others in our prison who were eye-witnesses to 
atrocities committed. It should not be understood 
that prison guards were fair representatives of the 
average Confederate soldier in the field. It is fair 
to presume that the majority of soldiers in the field 
voluntarily assumed the role of soldier, voluntarily 
remained, and no just critic will call in question their 
daring, their bravery, or their honesty of convictions. 
The prison guard, by contrast, was usually a conscript, 
often a stripling, bloated by his autocratic power, 
and more often brutal than humane. Their charac- 
teristics grew more pronounced as the length of their 
peculiar service increased, and their unsoldierly duties 
had a degrading influence upon what inborn manhood 
they might have originally possessed. 

It is pleasant to turn now from reciting the hard- 
ships, the heartaches, the suffering and cruelties that 
enter so largely into the story of our military prison 
life, to the consideration of a character so beautiful 
that memory paints her a human angel. Her home 
was by the side of the prison, only a rod or two distant, 
the stockade being on the line of her side door-yard ; 
her name was Mrs. Amanda Gardner. 

At the time of our detention in Cahaba Mrs. Gard- 
ner was a woman of about fifty years of age. Her 
personal appearance I am unable to describe, as I 
never had the pleasure of seeing her. Those who 
met her always spoke of her as a bright, sunny 



MRS. GARDNER. 2"]! 

Christian woman. Her husband was an invalid, un- 
able to enter any army, but one of her sons, a well- 
educated, intelligent young man of seventeen, was 
in the Army of Northern Virginia, and there gave 
up his life in some engagement. Two daughters 
were all I ever knew of ; one, "Little Belle," amiss 
of eight or ten ; the name of the other I never 
learned. 

As soon as prisoners were taken to Cahaba Mrs. 
Gardner became deeply interested in their condition, 
and began ministering to their necessities. Having 
but a moderate amount of worldly goods, her con- 
tributions could be but meagre; but almost daily 
a few potatoes, peas, green beans, green corn, and 
other vegetables were passed through a hole in the 
stockade to the Union men. She possessed quite 
a good library of all kinds of books, and as soon 
as some of our men discovered it, they requested and 
received the loan of the volumes. 

Previous to our arrival at the prison, probably 
during the winter of 1863-64, moved with pity at 
the terribly destitute condition of the men, whom 
she could plainly view from a chamber window, on 
one occasion she took bedding from her beds and 
even carpets from her floor and cut them up for 
blankets to cover the nakedness of the men and 
protect their bare bodies and limbs from the chill 
blasts of the winter. Her means of giving assistance, 



2/2 



CAHABA. 



even to a few, became nearly exhausted by the sum- 
mer of 1864. 

So long as Captain Henderson was in command 
of the prison no objection was ever offered to the 
angelic deeds of Mrs. Gardner; but a different per- 
son was his successor, Colonel Jones. 

For a few weeks during the latter portion of the 
summer of 1864, after our entrance, frequent gifts 
of vegetables were passed into the prison by " Little 
Belle." Watching a time when a kind-hearted guard 
was stationed on the side of the stockade next to 
her yard, the little girl would bring her offerings 
to the hole in the stockade, the guard would call 
some prisoner and pass the gift to him, and one 
mess at least would be envied by the whole prison 
so long as the precious food was in sight or memory. 
The mess to which we belonged was never so for- 
tunate as to be the recipients of any of these gifts, 
but we could not be blind to the humanity of one 
noble family, and their memory will be carried with 
the deepest reverence and love by all who were in- 
mates of Castle Morgan. 

One day an unfriendly guard observed the little 
girl making her daily offering, and reported her and 
her mother to the commander, Jones. An officer 
was at once despatched to interview and caution 
Mrs. Gardner. I was told she was formally ar- 
rested, and after that date the food offerings of 



THE LADDER. 



273 



this most noble and Christian woman were debarred 
to us. 

One of the methods of punishment inflicted upon 
the prisoners for their misdeeds was by " placing 
them on the ladder." Any violation of a prison 
rule for which the offender was not shot down at 
once might be punished by the ladder. The ladder, 
placed outside the stockade, in plain view from the 
windows of Mrs. Gardner, was of the ordinary kind, 
its upper end resting against, its lower several feet dis- 
tant from the stockade. One of the men placed on 
the ladder by order of Colonel Jones was a member of 
my brigade, George W. Loveless, of the Seventh 
Illinois Cavalry. His crime was striking a prisoner 
who had declared his intention to take the oath of 
allegiance to the Confederacy. Loveless, like others 
sentenced to the ladder, was compelled to grasp a 
rung so high that only the extremities of his shoes 
could touch the ground, and must sustain his weight 
by the hands for a prescribed number of minutes ; a 
guard was always near by to enforce the punishment. 

The punishment of prisoners by placing them 
upon the ladder was horrifying to Mrs. Gardner, and, 
after being compelled to witness several examples of 
what she pronounced a barbarity, she boldly sought 
the prison commander and protested against it. 
" Colonel Jones," she exclaimed, " I have given up 
to you and your officers the best rooms of my house ; 



2 74 



CAHABA. 



for your comfort and convenience I have sacrificed 
much ; grant me one request. If you will continue to 
punish men in that manner, I beg of you to remove 
the location of punishment ; do not continue it in a 
place where I and my children must be unwilling 
spectators ; 'tis brutalizing in its influence." Just such 
an answer was returned to her prayer as one who 
knew the man would reasonably expect. 

"Mrs. Gardner," he replied, " only my forbearance 
saves you from being sent away from your invalid 
husband and family of little children beyond our lines. 

Your sympathy for the d Yankees is odious to 

me. Now bear yourself with the utmost care in the 
future or you shall be an exile." Mrs. Gardner was a 
Southern woman by birth, education, and in sympa- 
thy ; her prayers for the success of the Confederate 
cause were as earnest as those of " Stonewall Jack- 
son ;" but her noble humanity, her Christianity, would 
not permit her to extend to or wish her near neigh- 
bors any hardship or severity not positively necessary 
for self-protection. 

When the war closed Mrs. Gardner, whose property 
in Cahaba had become worthless by the decay of the 
town, removed to Selma, that she might better sup- 
port by her labor her little children and invalid hus- 
band; and some time in 1883 or 1884 all that remained 
of the family removed to New York City. Dear, 
noble, kind-hearted woman, her memory is cherished 



MISS MARKS. 275 

with feelings of reverence by the men who were 
grateful witnesses of her angelic deeds and knew her 
motives. 

Another person who should be mentioned for her 
kindness was a Miss Marks, a nurse to the sick men 
outside. On one occasion a member of the Thirteenth 
Wisconsin Infantry, Alexander B. Campbell, moved 
by her kindness, questioned her as to the reason of it. 
Her answer was, " I have two brothers prisoners at 
Camp Douglass. I hope God will send some North- 
ern woman to do for them, when ^sick, what I am 
pleased to do for your men." 



CHAPTER XXII. 

SENT TO MERIDIAN GERE — UNABLE TO WALK — A 

BIPED BURRO EVERY-DAY LIFE AT MERIDIAN. 

THE hot, oven-like atmosphere that was nearly 
always present outside of the stockade during 
July and August and September was much more 
marked within that structure. The prison yard was 
an enclosure about one hundred and thirty feet long 
and, perhaps, sixty or seventy feet wide, surrounded on 
one side by the brick wall of the prison, about sixteen 
feet high, bounded on the other three sides by the 
stockade, whose height equalled that of the brick wall. 
The surface of the earth within the stockade was 
almost entirely dry sand ; this reflected the heat from 
the sun like millions of little mirrors, and the high 
walls about us in a great measure warded off all 
motion of the outer atmosphere. By the last of 
August there were more than a thousand prisoners 
with us, and to cook their food it was necessary to 
build fires all over the yard, within five or six feet of 
each other. The heat from these fires, added to the 
tropical heat of the sun, made the yard a little purgatory, 



SENT TO MERIDIAN. 



277 



and added to this was the black, bitter smoke with 
which they filled the air. October lessened the heat of 
the sun, but added more fires to the number already 
too numerous for comfort, and more smoke. On Oc- 
tober 19th about four hundred men who had been 
longest in Cahaba were called out of prison and 
placed on a boat for Selma, with the assurance by 
our guards that we were destined for exchange. My 
company was among those esteemed so fortunate, and 
while we were drawn up in line before the ofifice of 
the prison commander, several who had been confined 
to the hospital outside of the prison joined our ranks, 
among whom was my friend Gere. Gere had had a 
slight wound in his foot, which for a long time, while 
with us in the stockade, refused to heal. For several 
weeks it was merely a slight wound that gave less of 
pain than annoyance, but some time in October the dis- 
comfort became greater. The unhealed spot increased 
in size, locomotion became difficult, and manifestations 
of constitutional disturbance began to appear, and in- 
creasing day by day, he sought the privilege of going 
to the hospital outside, and his request was granted. 
He had been from us but a few days when unmistak- 
able signs of gangrene showed themselves in the 
wounded foot, and destroyed much of the skin and 
subcutaneous tissues before it could be arrested. He 
was still weak, pale, and feverish when he learned that 
there was a probability of exchange for those who 



278 CAHABA. 

had come to Cahaba with him ; and soliciting the 
aid of a companion, he found a pair of old cast-off 
crutches, and with the aid of these determined to go 
with us to our lines. Trembling from weakness and 
excitement, his face thin and pale from protracted 
suffering and disease, he came slowly toward us, and 
for a moment, so great a change had taken place in 
his appearance, I did not recognize him. Giving him 
what assistance I could, we were soon on the boat, and 
relating to each other our fortunes since we parted. 
To the sick man the prospect of returning to his 
home and friends once more acted like a strong stimu- 
lant, and he could not restrain himself from giving ex- 
presssion to his pleasure. By the time we arrived at 
Selma, however, two or three hours later, he was com- 
pletely exhausted, and only by the aid of another be- 
side myself could he make any progress. Finding that 
locomotion, even with these aids, would soon be im- 
possible, I placed him on my back, his arms around my 
neck, his legs about my hips, and in this way we trav- 
elled the distance from the boat to the cars, perhaps 
three fourths of a mile, and at Demopolis, McDowell's 
Landing, and Meridian repeated the scene. At each 
of these places the distance from the cars to the boat, 
from boat to cars, and from cars to prison, was from an 
eighth to half a mile, and our novel appearance in 
travelling the streets seemed one of the attractions 
that drew a crowd to view our battalion as it passed 



DEL USIONS. 2 79 

along. Our journey commenced at Cahaba early in 
the day, and we reached Meridian only long after 
dark. Here we were placed in the same pen we had 
occupied in July, but the comparatively large number 
compelled to occupy the small stockade made our sur- 
roundings no better than at Cahaba. In moving bodies 
of Union prisoners from one place of confinement to 
another in the Confederacy, it seemed a universal 
rule to assure them that they were on their way to be 
exchanged. This statement was made to us even in 
going from Meridian to Selma in the July previous. 
Then the statement was made that we would soon be 
sent to City Point, and there turned over to our 
authorities. When we were called out of Castle 
Morgan we were informed that we would be sent to 
Vicksburg, and knowing there was no large prison in 
Mississippi, a major portion of our number fully be- 
lieved the assertions thus made to them. Just before 
leaving Cahaba I conversed with another friend in the 
hospital, who, having lost his good right arm recently, 
was too weak to go with us. He told me we were 
not to be exchanged. He had formed his belief from 
overhearing the conversation of two Confederate offi- 
cers. The information robbed me of the pleasant 
dream indulged in by my comrades, but, as a com- 
pensation, my disappointment a few days later was 
less than many others. No allusion to any continua- 
tion of our homeward journey was made the following 



28o CAN ABA. 

morning, and as soon as the usual ration of meal was 
issued to us, all took up the usual dull round of captive 
occupations. As before, one of the buildings was re- 
served for the exclusive use of Confederate conscripts, 
deserters, etc., and not more than fifteen or twenty- 
could be comfortably housed in the other building. 
All the remainder of our four hundred was obliged to 
sleep out doors on the ground. Here we had one 
advantage, however, over Cahaba. The prison com- 
mander allowed us to have an axe to cut our wood 
with, and if we could get anything to make a cover 
for ourselves, we were permitted to make houses. As 
commissary of the company, I went outside of the 
stockade every other day to obtain our rations of meal 
and bacon. When out on these occasions I always 
looked about for something that I could take back 
with me to assist in making a house. Often it was 
impossible to get more than a single shingle or piece 
of board, perhaps a foot square, and at no time do I 
remember finding a piece of board more than three 
feet long and five or six inches wide. Once, in a hog- 
pen beside the commissary house, I espied a small tin 
baking pan, six inches wide and eight inches long, 
havino;' sides an inch hig'h ; it was covered with the 
filth of the pen, dented, twisted, and jambed, but it 
was the most valuable find that ever fell to my lot 
during my captivity, and I was regarded much as are 
men in Colorado who have discovered a valuable 



MAKING A SHELTER. 28 1 

mine. It was a veritable " bonanza." To us now, 
surrounded by all the comforts of life, how small a 
thing it seems to record the finding of a little piece 
of board six inches by eighteen, or a little tin pan 
trampled all out of shape by swine; but to us at that 
time these things were the maximum of possible 
boons. By much importuning was our mess per- 
mitted to go twice, with a guard, to the forest, a few 
rods away, and fetch an armful of boughs to spread 
upon the ground. The favor was, even then, only 
granted by representing that Gere was very ill, and 
his fever much increased by lying upon the cold, wet, 
bare earth. When it rained, as it often did at that 
season, we used to sit on the ground, " hunched up," 
and many a night did the majority sleep sitting on the 
bare ground, their knees drawn up to the chest, the 
head resting over the knees, or with legs crossed, 
Turkish fashion, an elbow upon the leg, and the hand 
supporting the head. If the nights were dry, two or 
three would sleep side by side, " spoon fashion." After 
two or three weeks of patient gathering of shingles, 
bits of wood, and boards, we had collected enough to 
make a house for our mess of four. It was made by 
driving into the ground, five feet apart, two crooked 
limbs, the crotches being three feet from the 
ground. A stick was laid from one limb to the 
other, and from this cross-piece sticks and boards 
extended, slanting to the ground four feet dis- 



2«2 



CAHABA. 



tant. On this framework, earth, chips, sods, etc., were 
piled. 

If the sticks were strong enough, a sufficient quan- 
tity of earth was laid to shed the rain ; but if observa- 
tion taught us the sticks would not bear so great a 
weight, we compromised, taking less earth and more 




OUR "dormitory" at meridian. 



rainfall. The sides were closed as thoroughly as we 
could do it with our means ; then our shelter was fin- 
ished. When extended at full length, with our heads 
" under the eaves," we were covered to our hips, the 
legs and feet exposed to the weather. If the limbs 
were drawn up a rain without wind would only fall 
upon the legs from the knees to the feet. Those who 
were sick or could not get outside of the stockade 
did not fare so well. 

Some kind-hearted philanthropist will wonder why 



A CATALOGUE OF DISEASES. 283 

we did not construct such houses for all the sick and 
complaining. Now, the fact was, it was an herculean 
task to build even so rude a structure as I hav^e de- 
scribed. Only six or eight were built at all, and every 
man seemed to be about as badly off physically as he 
could be, and there was something called a hospital in 
another stockade, to which the worst cases were sup- 
posed to go. 

As a compensation for sickness most men were 
granted by — shall I say a kind Providence } — dulled 
sensibilities. Men who had suffered long with diar- 
rhoea, dysentery, dyspepsia, scurvy, ague, and the re- 
mainder of that heart-sickening catalogue of diseases, 
passed gradually from cramps, pain, fever, thirst, head- 
ache, backache, and groans to whining, dulness, stupor, 
and at length to kind death, that terminates all of 
these. 

As an example, I recall a tall young boy, a member 
of the One Hundred and Fourteenth Illinois Infan- 
try. When I first noticed him, he had just begun to 
have diarrhoea and dysentery. The miserable, polluted 
surface water, the coarse meal, poorly cooked, the ex- 
posure to the cold rains, had produced their legitimate 
results, and he was going often to the " sink." A few 
days later his journeys were fully as frequent, but his 
steps were slower, his face was more hollow, his eyes 
more dull. He growled at first, then complained in a 
hollow voice ; the lines of pain and long-suffering deep- 



284 C AH ABA. 

ened upon his face ; his steps grew slower, weaker, 
sometimes staggering; he neglected to fasten his 
clothing; ftcces ran from the bowels as he slowly- 
dragged himself to the " sink." A day later he sat all 
day resting his chest upon his knees, his head falling 
forward. The next day he lay upon his side on the 
ground ; some one gave him all he had — some 
boughs of pine — for a bed. He was too weak to go 
to the "sink" now. The drawn, haggard, suffering 
face showed less of the agony he manifested a few 
days before, and more of weakness, dulness. The 
eyes grew more sunken, the discharges from the bowels 
were only a little bloody mucus. He could answer 
questions if one asked him anything; he asked occa- 
sionally for a sup of water, never for food. He was 
getting more and stupefied. During the day we 
placed over him whatever we could to render him 
as comfortable as possible. I went to him in the 
night — he was 'only a few feet away from us — and 
found him dead. 

A cold rain started in before morning, and at day- 
light some one pulled off his ragged garments to 
cover his own shivering limbs. A detail of our men 
bore him out of the gate and left him where he was 
enduring less of suffering than those of his comrades 
he had left in the stockade. 




G. J. TRENAMAN. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

ordway's attempt at escape and his punish- 
ment ESCAPE OF CONN, BUFFINGTON, AND THEIR 

COMRADES TRENAMAN's NARRATIVE. 

BELONGING to our mess was a tall, awkward 
boy named Ordvvay, who, though possessed of 
far more native shrewdness than a casual observer 
would suppose, was " queer," and at times was almost 
simple in his manner. 

Obtaining possession of a common table knife, he 
by some means converted the back of it into a crude 
saw, and with this attempted to saw through two of 
the timbers forming a part of the stockade. At that 
time a line had been marked a few feet from the 
stockade over which no captive was permitted to pass, 
so that all work must be done when it was so dark 
that a human form close to the stockade would not 
be observed by the sentries. Night after night he 
cautiously and slowly performed his dangerous work. 
To make an opening sufficiently large to admit the 
passage of his body it was necessary to saw both tim- 
bers through near the ground, and again at a point 



286 CAHABA. 

two or three feet higher. The two lower cuts had 
been finished and the upper ones begun when Ordway 
persuaded Trenaman, a gun-boat boy, to assist in the 
undertaking. Trenaman crossed the dead Hne and 
began work, but the probability of detection, and the 
certainty of death or of being maimed if discovered, 
soon caused him to retreat ; and he would not hazard 
his life again in the dangerous scheme. Ordway, how- 
ev^er, continued the work, and had nearly succeeded, 
when one day the marks of the saw were observed by 
some Confederate outside, and its origin traced to 
Ordway. The provost marshal, Fitzpatrick, afterward 
claimed to Trenaman to have known of the work 
from the first, and asserted that on the night when 
Trenaman had assisted Ordway he was himself stand- 
ing outside with a pistol, ready to shoot the first per- 
son who might attempt to pass through. The asser- 
tion of Fitzpatrick was probably untrue. 

As soon as the discovery of the work and its author 
had been made, Fitzpatrick had the sawn timbers 
brought inside the prison, and compelled Ordway to 
saw both into pieces just the length of his knife-blade, 
and split them into "kindlings" not larger than its 
handle, and decreed that all of the labor must be 
performed with the crude knife-saw, and no portion 
of the wood thus prepared could be used for fuel by 
any one of the prisoners. Poor Ordway, how many 
weary hours he passed over those timbers! No idling 



AN ATTEMPT TO ESCAPE. 287 

was permitted, but day after day rolled by ere his 
monotonous task was finished, and then the carefully 
guarded pile was sent to the office of the marshal for 
his private use, and Ordway breathed easier when a 
week passed by and no supplement was added to the 
sentence he had already served. He fully expected 
when his task was done that he would be tied up by 
his thumbs or " bucked and gagged" a portion of every 
day for a week. 

A few nights after the scheme of Ordway (com- 
monly known as " Kansas," on account of his being a 
member of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry) had been 
discovered and its originator punished, another little 
band of five determined to risk their lives in attempt- 
ing to escape, by going over instead of through the 
stockade. These five were " Andy " Conn, whom we 
have mentioned before as the " sheriff" of Castle 
Morgan; George Trenaman, who had assisted Ord- 
way in the attempt to saw through the stockade ; 
Hamilton J. Buffington, of the Forty-seventh Illinois; 
Tubbs, a native Mississippian, who had belonged to 
the Confederate Sixth Mississippi in the early part of 
the war, from which he had deserted ; and a fifth per- 
son named Green. 

About the top of the stockade, as was the case 
with all completed stockades, was a guard walk, wide 
enough for a sentry to pace back and forth while on 
duty. Each piece of walk around the four sides of the 



288 CAHABA. 

prison was provided with a sentry-box, placed near 
the centre of the walk, in which the sentinel could 
stand during stormy weather. The five comrades had 
determined to attempt their escape during the first 
stormy night, and this time seemed their opportunity, 
as it was very dark and raining hard, and all the little 
fires on that side of the prison had been extinguished 
by the fast-falling drops. 

Noting that the guards about the top of the stock- 
ade were carefully housed from the storm in their 
sentry-boxes, Conn crossed into the corner of the 
prison pen, while Buffington, crossing the dead line, 
mounted quietly upon his shoulders and drew himself 
to the top of the stockade, where, standing upon the 
guard walk, he silently drew up one after another of 
his companions, and assisted them to drop into the 
mud beneath them. Several other prisoners hap- 
pened to be near that part of the prison at the time, 
but the deeds of the fleeing men were so quickly per- 
formed that ere they had comprehended their import 
and recovered from their astonishment all had passed 
over the stockade and were noiselessly departing from 
it. In after years an account of their undertakings 
and suffering was written by one of their number, 
from which I have gleaned an outline of their experi- 
ences at that time. As soon as all were outside they 
passed quietly between the tents of the sleeping guard, 
temporarily off" duty. But a few rods away was the 



UNCERTAIN TRAVELLING. 289 

thick timber, and to this they directed their course, 
trustincr to the fast-falling rain to so wash away all 
scent of their tracks as to render it impossible for the 
hounds to follow them. Entering the timber, and 
travelling a mile or two, they stopped and huddled 
about a large tree, waiting for daylight to appear. 
Knowing how easy it is for persons to become lost or 
to travel in a circle when in darkness, they believed it 
safest to remain where they were until by the aid of 
daylight they could pursue the course they had de- 
cided upon. The nearest point where Union troops 
were stationed, except Mobile, was Vicksburg, one 
hundred and fifty miles away. As several of the party 
were acquainted with the country between that city 
and Jackson, and as the route to Vicksburg was 
through a country more easily travelled than the one 
toward Mobile, all decided to make Vicksburg their 
objective point ; but it was easier to decide where 
they would go than to be certain of the direction to it 
with no compass. With the sun hidden by day and 
the sky overcast by night, where was east and where 
west were mere matters of conjecture. One or two 
tried to recall their knowledge of wood-craft, and de- 
cide the points of the compass by noting the growth 
of the moss upon the trees. Depending at last upon 
the guesses of the majority, but with no certain data, 
they began their tramp through the pathless forest. 
Cheered with the prospects of again being free, they 
19 



290 CAHABA. 

marched steadily the greater part of three days and 
nights, giving only a few hours of each twenty-four to 
needed rest. During all this time they were unable 
to see the sun or a single guiding star, and saw no 
human being to whom they dared speak and obtain 
information as to the points of the compass. 

On the third night out, after fording a stream with 
the chilling water shoulder deep, about eight o'clock 
they encountered a negro, accompanied by a large 
hound, in the road. Trusting in that Providence 
which inspired the heart of the slave with freedom's 
hope and made him faithful in the hour of need, 
without fear they told him who they were and where 
they came from, whereupon he exclaimed, " My God, 
massa ge'men, you is only three miles from Meridian." 
This was disheartening. They had doubtless travelled 
enough to have covered a third of their journey, and 
were still hardly more than an hour's walk fi om the 
pen they had left three days before. Conversing fur- 
ther with the negro, he told them his cabin was but a 
short distance away, and, in answer to their inquiry for 
food, he volunteered to bring them something if they 
would remain where they were while he went to his 
cabin and prepared it. 

Hardly had he departed when a suspicion arose that 
he might not return alone — that he might inform their 
enemies and take them back to Meridian. To guard 
against this they left the place where he had promised 



A KIND-HEARTED NEGRO. 29 I 

to meet them, selecting a point from which they 
could steal away should they discover that he in- 
tended to be false to them. In due time, however, he 
returned alone, and guiding them to the shelter of an 
unused blacksmith shop, he placed before them a 
bountiful amount of corn-dodgers and bacon, the 
first food they had tasted since their escape. Said one 
of the number to me afterward, " I have since eaten at 
some of the best tables in America, but at no place 
did I ever have such a feast." The chef dit Delmoni- 
co's never placed before his guests viands so delicious 
as the dodgers and bacon of that black negro. Nor 
did the good offices of their new-found friend cease 
at simply feeding them. At the suggestion of one 
of the refugees, he volunteered to return to them by 
five A.M. on the following day and guide them as far 
as he could, with safety to himself, on their journey 
westward. The boys slept well on that dry ground 
floor. Long before daylight the negro came and pre- 
sented them with more dodgers and bacon, and also a 
bottle of Louisiana rum. To Trenaman the negro 
gave a pair of cotton pants and a shirt in exchange 
for a pair of cavalry pants of which he had come in 
possession at Cahaba. After this deal all were dressed 
in butternut clothing", but not one had a hat. 

Falling under the guidance of their dusky friend, 
they were piloted through the woods about five 
miles, and then given instructions to follow a certain 



292 



CAHABA. 



trail for about ten miles, which would bring them to 
the cabin of a friendly negro, who would pilot them 
farther on. They bade him a hearty good-by, for he 
proved a Moses to them. Trenaman, who was famil- 
iarly called by his companions " Jett," an abbrevia- 
tion of his middle name, had no shoes, and by this 
time was limping painfully on bruised and bleeding 
feet. To protect them, he tore from his shirt all that 
he could spare, and with the pieces bound them up, 
affording, however, but little protection. 

They had not gone far when a dispute arose as to 
the right road, for it was now daylight, and caution said, 
" Keep in the timber." Buffington aspired to the lead- 
ership of the party, but it was finally decided that 
Buffington and Green were to go the way they 
thought best, while Conn, Tubbs, and Jett were to 
take their choice of routes ; and thus they separated. 

Tramping all that day, on the approach of darkness 
they built a fire of chestnut rails, retired to their 
muddy beds, and it was not many seconds before they 
were dreaming of home and something to satisfy 
hunger. Jett had not been long asleep when he felt 
two or three thumps, and jumping to his feet, he heard 
Conn exclaim, "Jett, you are all afire!" Jett had his 
back to the fire while asleep, and Conn, awaking, 
found the chestnut rails had thrown sparks on Jett's 
shirt and set it on fire. By it he lost about eighteen 
inches in circumference of pants and shirt — in fact, be- 



UNCOMFORTABLE LODGING. 293 

tween the amounts taken to cover his feet and that 
consumed by the fire, he had but httle shirt left. 

Progress was made at times by dayhght through 
the timber and swamps, and at other times by night 
on the highway, the men avoiding all human beings, 
both white and black, and subsisting on yams dug 
from the fields. On the sixth or seventh day of their 
escape, about sundown, they came to a small clearing 
in the centre of which was an old weather-beaten 
frame house, resting on underpinnings about a foot and 
a half from the ground, and minus doors and windows. 
The only living things about the premises were an old 
sow and her litter of pigs, of the lean and hungry kind. 
The board floor was loose. The refugees had tramped 
almost continuously since the night of the fire. 

At no time were they so tired, hungry, and sore 
during their strike for liberty. Conn fell asleep at 
once ; Tubbs and Jett tore off some clapboards, and 
with Conn's flint, bowie knife, and a little cotton made 
a fire and were soon asleep. They had not been 
asleep long when suddenly Tubbs rolled over on to 
Jett. Both jumped to their feet, and stood peering at 
one another for some time. Here was a mystery. 
Lying down they again slept, but soon Jett rolled 
against Tubbs. Again both quickly roused up, and 
Tubbs angrily exclaimed to Trenaman that he would 
endure no more of his nonsense, and threatened chas- 
tisement if the occurrence was repeated. 



294 C AH ABA. 

Just then from under the floor came swinish grunts 
and squeals that suggested to the weary and irritated 
refugees a cause of their previous disturbances. The 
old sow and her progeny had established a " squat- 
ters' " home there, and every movement of her body 
lifted the floor above her. The discovery restored 
both men to good-humor, and once more they laid 
down together only to be disturbed again as before. 

Tubbs jumped to his feet with an exclamation of 
wrath, vowing vengeance on his tormentors. "Jett," 
said he, " hold up one of those boards, and I'll see if 
we can't have sweet vengeance on that old brute." 

Trenaman did as requested, and his companion 
seized a pig. It gave a horrible squeal, and before the 
captors could pull it through the floor the mother 
thrust her jaws through the opening, and to save 
himself from injury Tubbs dropped his prize. Both 
boys jumped on the board and kept the enraged 
brute from coming through. They waited till all was 
quiet and tried it again, this time with success. With 
Conn's bowie they cut its throat, skinned it, carved 
out the hams, and threw the remainder away. They 
placed the hams on a stick, broiled them, and then 
gnawed. There was hardly an ounce of meat on 
both shanks. They woke Conn and offered some to 
him, but he, after a casual examination, with a look of 
disappointment and disgust, fell back asleep. He 
was too weary even to eat. Morning came, and they 



DICKENSON. 



295 



pushed on, keeping by day in the timber near the 
highway, and travelling on the latter by night, keeping 
a sharp lookout for the Confederate patrol. When- 
ever the latter were discovered the boys would dodge 
into the timber until they had passed out of sight. 

The thought of being recaptured was ever upper- 
most in their minds. Several times they heard hounds 
upon their tracks, and as water was their only means 
of safety, they fled to the nearest streams and swamps, 
fortunately always near at hand. Here they would 
wade for hours, until assured that the danger from 
further pursuit was passed. Several days after the 
confiscation of the pig they ventured into the cabin 
of some negroes belonging on the plantation of Zack 
Williams, making, known their true character; and it 
may be remarked in passing that their confidence 
was never betrayed by any of the field slaves. The 
negroes gave the boys a good meal, and directed 
them to an old Unionist named Dickenson. After 
an all-night tramp they reached the cabin of the 
Unionist, and informing him who they were, made 
known their wants. He accepted their statements with- 
out hesitation, although he, as well as others, had paid 
dearly for placing confidence in similar statements 
made by Confederate soldiers for the purpose of test- 
ing their loyalty to the Southern cause. Dickenson, 
who was a typical " poor white," as soon as he had 
heard their statement, cried out to his wife, " Here, 



296 CAHABA. 

Catherine, now then yer can see sum generwine 
Yankees." The old woman, to whom evidently such 
a vision was one of the remarkable things of her life, 
held up both hands and exclaimed in astonishment, 
" Well, well, the' look jes' like other folks." 

The family, which was very poor and as ignorant as 
they were destitute, consisted of the old folks and two 
grown sons, who, to save themselves from conscription, 
remained hidden in the timber most of the time. 
Once Confederate soldiers went to the house to con- 
script the sons, and being disappointed in their expec- 
tations, pulled the old couple from their bed, tied their 
hands behind them, and then proceeded to demolish 
everything in the house. In some manner the old 
couple signalled to the sons that the " Yankees" were 
at the house, and the young men came home. A 
meal of squash alone was soon prepared and heartily 
eaten. During the day, to the surprise of all, Green 
came along. He claimed to have disagreed with Buf- 
fington, and that the two had voluntarily parted com- 
pany. By some friendly negroes Green also had been 
directed to " Massa Dickenson's." That night the 
boys started, under the guidance of the Dickenson 
boys, for Pearl River, distant twenty miles, and within 
fifty miles of Vicksburg. About midnight the guides 
pointed out the residence of a miserly old fellow who 
was a rampant friend of the Confederacy, and sug- 
gested that he be called up and compelled to con- 



THE HAKKENS FAMILY. 



297 



tribute something to their comfort. The proposition 
was accepted, and while the Dickensons were hidden 
close by, Tubbs knocked at the door. In response the 
old miser came out and asked what was wanted. 
Tubbs informed him that they wanted something to 
eat, and was told there was nothing in the house for 
them. " Now see here, old fellow, we've been in the 
ditches of Atlanta for the last six months. Hood's 
licked, and we's goin' home on furlough, and we uns is 
hungry, and if you don't open that ere door and give 
us somethin' ter eat, we'll kill every doggoned critter 
on the place." This plain proposition was understood 
by the old miser, and the door was thrown open at 
once. The boys were supplied with corn-bread and 
bacon quite bountifully, and soon bidding the old 
fellow good-night, they resumed their journey. About 
daybreak they arrived on the bank of Pearl River, 
where their guides left them. 

Taking possession of a ferry-boat, they crossed at 
once to the west bank, and went to Dogwood Ferry, 
where they were informed they would find friends by 
the name of Harkens. On arriving at the Harkens's 
house they found three young women from twenty-five 
to thirty years of age, who looked on them with a 
good deal of suspicion when the boys informed them 
that they were escaped Yankee prisoners. However, 
they welcomed the boys in, and in the course of half 
an hour, after a careful cross-questioning, three strap- 



298 CAHABA. 

ping fellows made their appearance, and in a very few 
minutes all were on friendly terms. The Harkens 
family were poor, having no slaves ; but, unlike the 
Dickensons, were men of some education and well 
informed. 

Our boys passed the day there, with one or other of 
the women always on the lookout. The rebellion 
was discussed in a general way, and the New York 
Tribune was quoted by the Harkens boys as though 
they received and read it daily. They spent their 
time in the timber, their food being brought to them 
by their wives. As darkness came on the boys pre- 
pared for another weary tramp. Jett, being the only 
barefooted one in the party, one of the women pre- 
sented him with a pair of white stockings and a pair 
of gaiters. The boys never forgot the kindness of the 
Dickenson and Harkens families. 

Travelling mostly by night, sometimes when it was 
so dark they clasped hands for fear of losing each 
other, and often hearing the hounds which they feared 
were on their track, they finally reached the Yazoo 
River. Here they found a ferry-boat, and were pro- 
ceeding to cross when a man came out of his house 
and hallooed. Getting no response, he fired a shot in 
the darkness toward them ; but as he did not approach 
them, they retained possession of the boat, and were 
soon across the river. 

The next day they met a middle-aged negro, and 



THE PATROL. 299 

telling him who they were, requested some food. It 
was hard to convince the man that they were " Yan- 
kees." The fellow, full of sympathy, burst out crying, 
and said : 

" Gemmen, you isn't fooling me, is you ?" They as- 
sured him that they were not, and asked him for an 
explanation of his strange conduct. He said : " I 
been dun fooled befo' by Confederate sojers. Dey 
whipped me hard, an' hanged two of Massa Simpson's 
boys on yon'er plantation." When the old man was 
fully convinced he took them to his cabin and fur- 
nished them with bread and bacon. 

A mile or two farther on, while walking in the 
highway, they came to a bend in the road, and there 
came in plain sight of a patrol. They were too near 
to escape by running, so they decided to walk directly 
toward them and depend upon some story of Tubbs's 
to extricate them from their undesirable position. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

trenaman's narrative continued. 

As a native Mississippian, Tubbs spoke the dialect 
of the Southern people, and at all times, as 
much as possible, he carried on conversation with 
doubtful strangers. Directly on their escape it had 
been agreed that if they should get into close quarters 
Tubbs was to act as spokesman, the others to keep 
silent till called upon to speak. So to the questions, 
" Who are you all ? where you all from ? and where ye 
goen ?" Tubbs answered : 

" We're from Atlanta, and goin' hum on furlough." 

" What regiment do you all b'long to }" 

" Sixth Mississippi." 

" Who is yer kernel ? what company ye b'long to, 
and who is yer capten ?" 

" Kernel Jones ; Company B ; Capt'n Gault." 

" So the Yanks cleaned Hood out, did they ?" 

" Yas." 

" Well, good-day ; wish the doggoned war was 
over." 

When safely past the patrol, the boys blessed Tubbs 



A GOOD HE ST. 3OI 

and his Southern dialect again and again. After days 
of travel, sleeping occasionally in cotton-gins, but 
oftener in the woods, and at such times suffering in- 
describable agonies, caused by the cold ; living on 
persimmons, and occasionally catching an opossum 
and trading for corn pones with the negroes, they 
came to a plantation belonging to a Mr. Donaldson, a 
few miles in the rear of Yazoo City. They found, 
after close inspection, the only persons in charge were 
a negro man and child. With this friendly negro the 
boys tarried three days. The child, a bright little 
fellow about seven years of age, was always on picket 
during the daytime. Here they slept in the owner's 
bed, ate of his pork and potatoes, and when ready to 
depart, having had a good rest and gained much in 
strength, their benefactor supplied them with rations 
the like of which they had not seen since their un- 
willing departure from " God's country." 

A few days after this, and on the evening of De- 
cember 6th — a bitter cold night, the ground frozen 
hard— they came to a large white house, in the rear of 
which was a negro cabin. It was suggested that 
Green enter the cabin and inquire if that road led to 
Vicksburg. Green went in while the rest of the party 
stayed outside, shivering in the cold. After what 
seemed ages to them Jett exclaimed : " Andy, for 
God's sake, let's go in and get Green. He is warming 
himself, while we are freezing." 



302 CAHABA. 

They went in, and there was Green standing com- 
placently with his back to the fire. With him was a 
saucy old wench and a well-dressed octoroon. They 
would give the boys no information, and were loath to 
give them anything to eat. In the mean time, the 
octoroon had slipped out unnoticed, and upon her 
absence being discovered, Conn grew suspicious and 
urged an immediate departure ; but Jett begged to be 
allowed to warm himself a few minutes longer. 

As they were about to depart the wide cabin door 
was suddenly thrown open and six or eight shining 
gun-barrels appeared, pointing toward them. Imme- 
diately a voice cried out : " Surrender, men ; you are 
our prisoners." Conn replied, " We surrender." 

The sergeant who had charge of the rebel squad 
said : " Who are you and what are you doing here .?" 

Conn answered : " We are Yankee prisoners, and 
having made our escape, are trying to reach our lines." 

" That's all right ; fall in," was the command, and 
with a rebel on each side of a Yank, they were 
marched to the scout's headquarters, about half a mile 
back in the timber. They proved to be a detachment 
of Captain Jones's scouts or so-called guerillas. The 
octoroon had informed her master, a Dr. Watts, 
and he in turn informed the scouts of the presence of 
the Yankee prisoners. At the time of their recapture 
they were within thirty miles of Vicksburg, the guid- 
ing star of their hopes. Next morning under a strong 



RECAPTURED. 



303 



guard they set out for Jackson, Miss., by way of 
Canton. Reaching Canton on the second night, they 
were lodged in the Canton jail, and here were joined 
by Buffington, who was recaptured that day. Again 
they were altogether. Four weeks had elapsed since 
their escape. At Canton jail was incarcerated a man 
named Meredith, who had been a purchasing agent for 
the Confederate government, and who, it was reported, 
had placed three hundred head of hogs belonging to 
the Confederate government on his own plantation, 
and reported them captured by the Federals. A Con- 
federate agent discovered the fraud, and he, learning of 
it, made good his escape to the Federal lines, from 
which time he made Cincinnati his temporary home, 
occasionally going to Vicksburg, then ascending the 
Yazoo River in a dugout to Yazoo City, and thence 
overland to his family, who resided on his plantation in 
the rear of the city. The scouts learned of these occa- 
sional trips, and at last captured him and brought him 
to Canton, where he was confined with the Yankee 
prisoners. 

On the fourth day all reached Jackson, where they 
found the inhabitants fleeing from the town, fearing a 
raid by Colonel Osburn. The last train having left 
for Meridian before their arrival, they \N^r^ placed in a 
box car with a lot of negroes and carried to Granada, 
Miss., where were a number of Wisconsin three- 
months men captured by Forrest in his raid into 



304 CAHABA. 

Memphis. Many of them had their legs badly lacer- 
ated by dogs in their futile efforts to escape. At the 
station south of Granada, Buffington, Conn, and Mere- 
dith made a desperate jump for liberty from the car. 
The guards fired at them, but all made their escape 
unharmed. 

At Granada, Tubbs, Green, and Jett were placed in 
a tobacco warehouse. No fires were allowed them, 
and their food consisted only of corn in the ear. In a 
few days they were removed to Meridian, but found 
the survivors of the four hundred whom they had left 
in the stockade had been sent back to Cahaba, to 
which place in a few days they followed them. 

A few years ago, at the request of an editorial 
friend, Buffington published in a Western journal a 
reminiscence of his experience from the time of sepa- 
rating from his comrades. The cause of separation 
was a disagreement as to which of the roads was the 
better to travel. From his articles I shall give a con- 
densed account of his experience, as in no other way 
can the full meaning of the phrase " an escaped pris- 
oner " be so vividly conveyed to the reader. Buffing- 
ton is still living (1888), a resident of Kansas ; but the 
enormous tax upon his physical and mental powers 
endured in the weeks of his desperate struggle for 
freedom have left a sad impress upon the once iron 
frame and unbending will. Mentioning the cause of 
separation, he continues: 



B UFFING TON' S NA RRA TI VE. 



305 



" After we agreed to disagree and separate, Green 
and I struck out for ourselves, and soon reached an 
old log-house about half full of cotton. We were 
tired and foot-sore, and the cotton looked so inviting 
we could not resist the temptation, so we crawled in, 
laid down, and slept until the sun was about an hour 
high. We awoke much refreshed, and started out. 
We went down the bottom about a mile, and came to 
a good road running east and west. The sun came 
out bright, clear, and warm, infusing new life into our 
chilled bodies, and adding a glow of brightness to the 
cheerless landscape. It was a pleasant, grateful sight 
for us to behold the warm, bright face of the sun once 
more, as it was our first glimpse of the ' god of day ' 
since three days before leaving the prison. We trav- 
elled west for a few miles until we came to a large 
stream, which we crossed on a big bridge, and then dis- 
covered a number of houses on one side, which we 
took to be negro cabins. As we were almost fam- 
ished with hunger, we directed our steps toward the 
cabins, in the hope of securing a meal. Our supposi- 
tion as to the occupants of the cabins was a great mis- 
take, but, as it turned out, proved a fortunate one for 
us. We were about as hard-looking specimens of 
humanity as could be found anywhere within the 
limits of civilization, and it required considerable 
pluck to approach any well-regulated household, even 
though hunger was gnawing our very vitals. We 



20 



306 CAHABA. 

were both bareheaded and barefooted, and our cloth- 
ing consisted of an assortment of rags which only 
by courtesy could be called pants and shirt. We 
marched boldly up to the door of one of the cabins 
and knocked. The door was soon opened, and we 
thought our game was up, for there stood an old man 
facing us, his eyes wide open in astonishment, and a 
perplexed look on his brow. He talked for a minute, 
then asked us to come in. He asked us who we were, 
where we came from, and what we wanted. It occurred 
to us that the old gentleman had a tender heart, and 
was, perhaps, a rebel only from force of circumstances, 
so we determined to tell him the truth. We told him 
we were Yankee prisoners, had escaped, and were en- 
deavoring to reach the Union lines. After conversing 
for a short time, the old man ordered supper for us. 
The meal was soon prepared. It was an excellent 
one, and we did it full justice. Shortly after supper 
the old man showed us to our bed, and left us alone. 

" Green and I lay awake for a long time discussing 
our situation, and fully made up our minds that we 
would awake to find ourselves captured, and would 
soon be taken back to that horrible den we had suf- 
fered so much in endeavoring to escape from. But 
there was nothing to be done. If the old man in- 
tended to betray us we were already under guard, and 
if he did not all would possibly be well in the morn- 
ing. So, resigning ourselves to our fate, whatever it 



A KIND-HEARTED SOUTHERNER. 307 

might be, we soon were fast asleep and dreaming of 
our own firesides and loved ones in far-distant States. 
" Our host awakened us in the morning, and after 
we had made our toilet, set an excellent breakfast 
before us, which, to our eyes, seemed a feast fit for the 
gods. After breakfast the old gentleman invited us to 
seats before the old-fashioned fireplace, and then told 
us that two of his sons were among the guards at the 
Meridian prison from which we had escaped. One of 
them had been home on a visit a few days before our 
escape, and had told him all about the horrible condi- 
tion and cruel treatment of the prisoners, and there- 
fore he could not find it in his heart to report us and 
have us sent back to such a place. While, perhaps, 
his duty to the Confederacy would require him to de- 
liver us up, he believed it would be an inhuman and 
unchristian act, and he would not do it. Instead, this 
kind-hearted old Southerner resolved to do what little 
he could to make us comfortable and help us along on 
our journey to liberty. He told us to go upstairs and 
keep hid that day, and he would try to make us each 
a pair of shoes before night. By nine o'clock that 
evening he had our shoes ready. They were rather 
light and thin, but beat going barefooted all to pieces. 
He then gave each of us an old coat, and gave me a 
hat and Green a cap. He also supplied us liberally 
with provisions from his scanty store, and gave us 
all the information he could about the route to our 



308 CAHABA. 

destination. With tears in our eyes and words of 
gratitude on our lips we bade the old man a hearty 
good-by, and started on our dark and lonely road to 
the Mississippi. 

" Right at this point in our journey my mind is a 
total blank. There are eight or nine days that I abso- 
lutely cannot account for. I do not know whether I 
was sick or well, where we went, or what happened to 
us. The record of those days is absolutely lost so far as 
I am concerned. The next thing I remember is that 
as we were travelling along the road we learned from a 
darkey that the other boys were about two miles ahead 
of us, at the home of a man named Dickenson. I had 
been feeling very weak and sick, and soon I had to 
give up entirely, as I was prostrated by a severe at- 
tack of chills and fever. I was terribly ill ; if my life 
depended on going a mile farther, I would have surely 
lost it. My head seemed on fire and ready to split 
open with the terrible pain. At one moment I 
was burning up, and the next as cold as death. So 
I laid down in a fence corner and told Green to go 
on and find the other boys and tell them that I was 
down sick, and then come back to me. I knew the 
boys would return instantly as soon as they knew of 
my helpless condition, and help me to a place of refuge 
until I should be able to continue the journey. 

" Green accordingly started, and I laid down on the 
cold, damp ground to await his return. Every min- 



A NIGHT OF DREADFUL SUSPENSE. 309 

ute seemed an hour, and the time seemed an age. I 
waited patiently, however, until a much greater length 
of time had elapsed than was necessary to go to Dick- 
enson's and come back. Then I began to be alarmed, 
and all sorts of wild fancies filled my fevered brain. 
I was sure I had been deserted by Green, and left to 
perish miserably alone thousands of miles away from 
home, without a kind word from any one or a tender 
hand to give me the least comfort or assistance in my 
awful agony. The night was passed in terrible dreams 
and short waking spells, when the awful loneliness of 
my position would force itself upon me despite my 
great sufferings. My mouth was parched and my 
head on fire. It seemed if I did not get a drink of 
water I would surely perish. Toward morning nature 
came to my relief, and I fell into a sound and dream- 
less slumber. 

" The sun was up when I awoke, and although feel- 
ing very sick and exhausted, I determined to reach 
Dickenson's, which I knew was only about two miles 
away. So, mustering all my strength, and concentrat- 
ing my will to force my shaky limbs to do their duty, 
I started out, and finally reached the home of Mr. 
Dickenson in a very weak and exhausted condition. 
I found them to be very kind and friendly Union peo- 
ple. They took me in, put me to bed, and took such 
good care of me that in two or three days I was my- 
self again, and ready to resume my journey. Here I 



3IO CAHABA. 

learned that Green had cruelly deserted me, and had 
given to the other boys, as a reason for being alone, 
that he and myself had had a disagreement. In the 
course of a day or two, owing to the good nursing and 
care I received from the Dickensons, I was able to 
resume my journey. 

" Bidding the old folks a hearty good-by, I started 
again toward the Mississippi, and arrived at Pearl 
River in the night, about twenty hours after leaving 
the home of the Dickensons. The only means of 
crossing the river was by a ferry, and as the ferryman 
— an Irishman, whom I afterward found had but little 
interest in the Confederacy — lived on the other side 
of the river, I secreted myself until some time in the 
forenoon, when I returned to the ferry and started 
across. As we approached the shore I noticed there 
was a long, deep cut under the west bank, and it was 
well for me that it was there ; for just as the boat 
touched the shore, four Rebel scouts came toward the 
ferry. My heart ^ came up in my mouth,' and I was 
almost paralyzed for an instant. But, recovering my- 
self, I made an excuse to step aside a moment. I 
went into the cut, walked a few steps, until I was out 
of sight, then ' took to my heels ' and ran for dear life 
for half a mile, when I found refuge in a canebrake 
without being discovered. Emerging from the cane- 
brake in a short time, I travelled the remainder of the 
day through the woods and away from all roads until 



BLOOD-CURDLING STORIES. 



311 



late in the evening, when I secreted myself in a deep 
hollow and slept a- portion of the night ; and finding 
the weather too cold to sleep comfortably, I continued 
my journey until the following forenoon, when I came 
to a log-cabin where some poor white women lived. 
I told them I was going home to Arkansas on a fur- 
lough, and was desperately hungry. They gave me 
something to eat, and told me to keep a sharp lookout 
for the hounds, for some Yankees had recently escaped 
from the prison at Meridian, and the officers were 
hunting them with the blood-hounds. They told me 
some blood-curdling stories about these ferocious 
hounds, little dreaming that I was one of the 'Yanks' 
they were pursuing. The men had put the dogs on a 
white woman's trail only a few days before, thinking 
it was one of the escaped prisoners, and the dogs had 
caught her and torn her all to pieces before the Rebels 
could get there to prevent it. This information 
brightened up my ideas considerably, and I resolved 
to be very cautious in the future, as I had no desire to 
furnish meat for those terrible devils. Leaving the 
cabin, I continued westward until I was out of their 
sight, when I went into the woods and hid until night, 
when I started out again, and soon reached a large 
plantation. Here I went to the negroes to get some- 
thing to eat, but they told me the overseer was a 
negro, but also a red-hot Rebel, and he would surely 
betray me if he discovered me. You may be sure I 



3 I 2 CAHABA. 

shook the dust of that inhospitable place off my feet 
in very short order. I soon discovered some more 
negro cabins, and had better success this time in get- 
ting food to appease my hunger. I travelled all that 
night until the roosters commenced crowing for day, 
and was very tired and completely chilled through. 
Discovering an old cabin on one side, a little way off 
the road, I went in, and found it partly filled with 
corn-husks. Making as comfortable a nest as possible, 
I crawled in and went to sleep. 

" Some time in the morning I was awakened, and 
found a middle-aged white woman standing over me, 
wringing her hands, half laughing and half crying, and 
before I could get my wits together she exclaimed, 
' My Lord, William, what are you doing here } 
What made you act so ? Why didn't you come into 
the house?'" 



CHAPTER XXV. 

THE STORY OF BUFFINGTON's ESCAPE. 

I GOT up and commenced rubbing my eyes, and all 
this time she kept asking me questions and tell- 
ing me how glad she was that I had got back. I was 
all at sea at first, and could not imagine what she was 
driving at. Pretty soon, however, it dawned upon my 
mind that she took me for her husband, who had evi- 
dently gone to the army, and I thought I had struck a 
remarkable piece of good fortune and would be ten- 
derly cared for. But it soon occurred to me that the 
neighbors would readily discover the imposition, even 
if the lady herself did not, and my last condition would 
be worse than the first ; so I resolved to abrogate all 
claims to her affections, and show her that she was 
mistaken in the man. All this took only a moment 
to think of, and during that time the poor woman 
was showering endearing epithets and scoldings alter- 
nately on my unprotected head. As soon as I got a 
chance to put in a word, I told her she was mistaken 
in the man ; but she would not have it that way, and I 
had to argue with her for some time before I could con- 
vince her that I was not her ' dear William.' I had 



214 CAHABA. 

been talking to her only a few moments before I 
discovered that she was a strong Unionist, and that 
caused me to believe her husband was a victim of the 
Rebel conscription ; but I had great difficulty in con- 
vincing her. She had not heard from her husband for 
many months, and this, together with the privations 
and terrors incident to the time and place, had prob- 
ably unsettled her reason. Poor woman ! her fate was 
a sad one ; but it was only a sample of thousands 
of others — in fact, of all Union people who were so un- 
fortunate as to be compelled to live in the South dur- 
ing the war. 

" There was a school-teacher named Agnes living 
with this lady. She was young and handsome, but, 
more than all, she had a warm, tender heart, was de- 
voted to the Union cause, and was very kind to me. 
I had a long talk with her, and received considerable 
information concerning the condition of the country 
and my chances of reaching the Union lines without 
being recaptured. She gave me something to eat, and 
then advised me to go back to the corn-crib and keep 
hid that day, and she would send up the river about 
five miles for another Union man who was hiding 
from the conscription, and who would very likely 
guide me a considerable distance on my journey. Tow- 
ard evening the man came, and we had a long talk 
about the prospect of getting through. But he did 
not approve of the scheme, and was afraid he would 



A FIERCE-LOOKING OLD MAN. 315 

2fet causfht. So he g^ave me all the information he 
could, but refused to go with me. I bid the fair 
Agnes a tender good-by, and promised to write to her 
if I lived until the war was over. But I am sorry to 
say I never fulfilled that promise. I forgot her ad- 
dress, and although I often thought of her great kind- 
' ness to me in my hour of need, I was unable to do 
even that little afterward to show my appreciation. 

"As night came on, I prepared to resume my lonely 
journey. I was within five miles of Black River, and 
being comparatively rested, I soon covered that dis- 
tance, and crossed that river without any adventure 
worthy of note. After crossing the river I travelled 
four or five miles west, until I came to a high ridge, 
on which I saw a few log huts, which I took to be 
negro cabins ; but I was terribly mistaken. I was very 
cautious, however, and creeping up as quietly as I 
could, I knocked at the door of one of the cabins. 
I heard somebody getting out of bed, and soon the 
door was opened by a fierce-looking old man. Just 
then the hounds turned themselves loose and began 
baying like demons, and the deuce was to pay. I was 
scared nearly out of my w^its, but determined to stand 
my ground bravely, come what would. The old man 
asked me who I was, where I was going, and what in 
h — 1 I was doing there at that time of the night. I felt 
that the truth would be best, so I gave it to him. 
But he wouldn't have it that way. He said he knew 



3l6 CAHABA. 

I was a Rebel deserter running away from the 
army, and cursed me for a cowardly whelp. Then he 
went and got his gun, and talked about shooting me ; 
but he must have changed his mind, for he didn't do 
it. Before I talked with him a great while I became 
convinced that he had been a slave overseer, or ' nig- 
ger-driver,' as they were appropriately called before the 
war, and he was now out of a job, and that was proba- 
bly what was the matter with him. I rubbed down 
his ruffled feathers as well as I could, and he finally 
took me in and kept me all night. After I had told 
him my story he became quite clever. He told me 
his name was Chumley, and soon showed that he was 
not so much of a brute as he at first appeared to be. 

"About nine o'clock next morning some Rebel 
soldiers came to the cabin and demanded that I 
should be surrendered to them, but he refused to 
give me up. He kept me at his house all day, and 
killed a hog, on which we had quite a feast. Toward 
evening he took me down to the Rebel commander 
at that place, and he sent me down to Canton on the 
railroad. I arrived in Canton about sunset, and found 
everything in the wildest confusion. People were 
running about the streets as though they were all 
crazy, and animals of all kinds were rushing around 
the streets, each one adding his musical tones to the 
infernal din ; but above all could be heard the boom- 
ing of cannon only a few miles away, and then I 



PANIC-STRICKEN CITIZENS. 317 

knew what was the matter. The terrible voice 
of the Yankee cannon was scaring the poor inhab- 
itants out of their wits, and they expected the Yanks 
would be down upon them any minute and devour 
them, or something worse. The guard hurried me 
toward the jail, and when I arrived, who should I 
see coming out of the jail but Conn, Trenaman, 
Tubbs, and Green, who had been captured some 
time before. They marched us all down to the cars 
again, and the officer gave the guards orders to blow 
the brains out of the first d — d Yankee son of a — 
that made a misstep. They put us into an old box- 
car on a train that was loaded down with citizens 
and plunder. It was a long train, and completely 
packed with the frightened Cantonians, who were 
fleeing from the wrath to come. They started the 
train off some time that night and went up the 
road about twenty-five miles, and then stopped 
until morning. In the morning they started up and 
ran awhile, and then stopped to take a rest. 

" There were three or four guards with us in the 
car, and as soon as Conn and I had a chance to speak 
to each other we commenced to devise plans of 
escape. We had very little chance to talk, because 
the guards were so close to us, but after some time 
and considerable manoeuvring we got the rest of the 
boys to agree to help us to disarm the guards, but 
before we had a chance to try it Green backed out, 



3l8 CAHABA. 

and as Trenaman's feet were so sore that he couldn't 
travel anyhow, Conn and I resolved to make our 
escape if possible, and let the others look out for 
themselves. There was nothing else to be done 
under the present circumstances, and it was a des- 
perate undertaking at the best. 

"There was a good-sized hole in one side of the 
old car, caused probably by a collision, and several 
sacks of corn were piled directly under it. One of 
the guards stood near this hole, and one at each side 
of the door. Conn and I made up our minds to escape 
or die in the attempt, and we decided that hole in the 
side of the car would be either a gateway to liberty 
or death. I told Conn to get up on the corn-sacks, 
and when he got ready to jump to give a shout. In 
a few minutes he shouted, and out he went. I drew 
the other guards' attention by telling them to look 
at those fellows getting out at the door, and then 
I jumped and landed in a heap in the mud, but 
quickly entered some timber near the track. It 
was just about sundown when I escaped, and when 
I got into the timber I hugged the ground close 
until dark. But I heard nothing of poor Conn, 
and never saw him again. 

" For two days I travelled without a morsel to eat, 
arriving at a little river just before morning on the 
third day. After crossing the river I came to a little 
negro cabin on the outskirts of a village, where the 



CHEERING NEWS. 



319 



wildest confusion seemed to prevail. I asked a 
darkey what the commotion was down in the town, 
and he told me that the Yankees were coming, and 
that the people were driving their cattle, horses, 
and hogs out into the swamps to save them from 
the enemy. This was cheering news to me. If I 
could fall in with our troops at this point, it would 
save me many days' privation and hardship. I was 
never backward in revealing myself to a darkey, 
because nearly all of them were with our cause heart 
and soul, and ever willing to do what little they could, 
or dared, to help the Union cause. So I told the 
negro who I was, and gave him an account of my 
adventures since my escape, and he at once promised 
to do what he could for me. He took me to an 
old log house close by, and told me to lay close and 
he would keep me posted as to the arrival of our 
troops and bring me something to eat. The house 
was about half full of cotton, so I made me a com- 
fortable nest, and remained there till about midnight, 
when the darkey returned and told me that the Yan- 
kees had gone in another direction, and did not come 
into the town. This was a great disappointment, but 
I was getting sadly used to such, and it did not 
long rest on my mind. 

" The darkey then guided me down to the river to 
a place where a canoe was hid in the willows, and told 
me to take it and row down the river. This looked 



320 



CAHABA. 



like a better and more rapid manner of travelling 
than that which I had been accustomed to, and 
I accepted it with pleasure. I got in and pulled 
down the river, and kept going all night. As soon 
as daylight appeared over the eastern hills I pulled 
the canoe up into the willows and laid down. I 
remained there all day, and as night came again 
I launched my frail bark once more and started 
down stream. There was hardly any current, and 
I soon found that it was a very slow way of travelling. 
The night was very cold, and my hands were stiff 
and sore with their unaccustomed work at the oar. 
About ten o'clock that night I came to an old 
plantation, and I resolved to abandon the canoe and 
resume my old way of travelling. I pulled into 
the shore, and getting out, shoved the little boat out 
into the stream, and bid it good-by as it glided 
silently away from me in the darkness. I went 
up to the houses, and found every one had left the 
plantation but one old darkey, who was left to look 
after property. The darkey was very kind to me, 
and I was in a condition to thoroughly appreciate 
it. He baked me some corn bread in front of the 
old-fashioned fireplace, and then milked some of 
the cows and set a large pitcher of the delicious 
beverage in front of me. It is hardly possible for 
people who have eaten three meals a day all their 
lives to understand what a feast this was to me ; 



A TIRESOME JO URNE V. 3 2 I 

but some of the ' boys ' who have suffered priva- 
tions similar to mine can understand what a treat 
this homely meal was to me at that time. 

" I found that I was now about thirty miles from 
the Mississippi River, and after bidding my kind friend 
good-by I started west again. The country from the 
plantation to the Mississippi is almost all swampy, 
and the travelling was very difficult and anything but 
pleasant. I travelled all that night and part of the 
next day, then hunted up a dry spot and slept until 
night, when I again resumed my journey. During the 
night it clouded up and began to drizzle rain. It got 
so dark that I could not see anything, and I was up 
to my knees in mud about half of the time. It was 
very cold and damp, and about as unpleasant for so 
forlorn a traveller as I was as it could be. Presently I 
discovered a light some distance from the road, and 
started for it. My previous experience in cases of this 
kind had taught me a lesson, and I resolved to be very 
cautious and investigate the surroundings thoroughly 
before making any further calls. I made a careful sur- 
vey of the premises, then stealthily crawled up to the 
cabin door and listened. I heard a number of voices 
within, but for some time was unable to catch the 
drift of the conversation. After intently listening for 
several minutes I discovered that the occupants of the 
room were two young women, some small children, 
and a Rebel soldier. They were roasting peanuts, and 



32 2 CAHABA. 

seemed to be enjoying themselves very much. The 
presence of the Rebel soldier was a damper on my 
prospects, but I determined to tell him some kind of 
a yarn, and take the chances of being detected. I 
accordingly knocked on the door, and it was opened 
by one of the women, who invited me in. I went in, 
and told them that I lived over in Arkansas, and was 
going home on a furlough. I chatted with them for 
awhile, and they proved to be the most ignorant 
people I had ever met, even in the most God-forsaken 
country districts of the South. They absolutely knew 
nothing, and their ideas about the war and the Yankees 
would make a cast-iron image smile. The Rebel sol- 
dier was the most intelligent of the trio, and I got as 
much information from him as I could about the dis- 
tance to the Mississippi and the probable location of 
the Union gun-boats. He said that the Rebels gen- 
erally crossed the river at Greenville on a flat-boat, 
which they arranged so that they could raise and sink 
it whenever they wanted to. When they wanted to 
use it they would raise it, and as soon as they were 
through with it they sunk it again. He said it was 
sunk at the time, and they could not raise it because 
there was a Union gun-boat up the river near Green- 
ville. The news about one of our gun-boats at 
Greenville was joyous tidings to me, and made me 
feel good clear down to my feet, but I didn't dare 
show it. However, I resolved to get to Greenville in 



HUNGRY AND SLEEPLESS. 



323 



he least possible time. The good news almost made 
me forget how tired and hungry I was, but the aching 
void in my stomach soon asserted itself, and I asked 
the girls for something to eat. But they told me they 
had not a thing to eat in the house, nor anything to 
make it with. Their father had gone to mill that 
day, but was not expected home till the next day. I 
had some Confederate scrip that I picked up some- 
where, and I bought some peanuts of them, on which 
I made a very light supper, and then went to bed. 
But I could not sleep. Between the pangs of hunger 
and the wild fancies of freedom that had taken pos- 
session of my brain when I heard about the gun-boats, 
I was kept wide awake. Sleep was impossible, and 
after rolling and tumbling around for a couple of 
hours, I finally got up and struck out for the river, 
which was now the Mecca of my hope and ambition. 
I travelled until nearly daylight, and then looked 
about for some place of concealment. The country 
all around me was filled with Rebel scouts, and great 
care and caution was necessary to avoid detection. I 
left the road and went into the timber, where I soon 
found a large hollow log, and into this I crawled and 
remained all day without a morsel to eat or even a 
drop of water. It was not quite so pleasant as sleep- 
ing on a feather bed, but I had got used to such little 
inconveniences and did not mind it very much. But 
I dreaded the thought of the journey I would have to 



324 CAHABA. 

make that night. The country was a vast swamp be- 
tween me and the next plantation, which was five 
miles away. 

"As soon as it got dark I crawled out of the log and 
started on my dreary tramp. The night was cold and 
frosty, and I was soon chilled clear through. More 
than half the time I was up to my waist in mud and 
water, and I have often wondered since how I endured 
the terrible sufferings of that awful night. But the 
hope of soon reaching the river gave me courage to 
push on as long as I had a vestige of strength left, and 
I finally reached the plantation, completely exhausted 
and almost chilled to death. I dragged myself around 
to the negro quarters, but found them entirely de- 
serted ; and then my courage entirely forsook me, and 
for a moment I was ready to lie down and die. In 
the mean time I had discovered that there was a 
Rebel battery at the house, which was on its way to 
the river to shell the Union boats. I went up to the 
gate in front of the big white house, and leaning on it 
for support, I debated whether to go in and give my- 
self up to the Rebels, in the hope of getting warm 
and possibly of getting something to eat, or whether I 
would endeavor to go on and try to find rest and re- 
freshment elsewhere. I studied about the matter for 
some time, and finally resolved to go on and reach the 
river or die in the attempt. 

" Having come to this resolution, I started to put it 



A HOSPITABLE NEGRO. 325 

into execution, but found that I was so cold and stiff 
that I could hardly move, and when I took my arms 
off the gate I had great difficulty to keep from falling 
to the ground. I kept walking around to prevent 
myself from freezing, and as soon as I had gotten my 
limbs loosened up a little I started and ran for some 
distance, which warmed me up a little, and I began to 
feel a degree less miserable. Travelling something 
over a mile, I came to an old negro cabin, and the 
charitable occupant gave me a kindly welcome to his 
humble home. He had a big fire in an old-fashioned 
fireplace, and I soon warmed myself in front of its 
cheery blaze and dried my miserable old rags. In the 
mean time the old man gave me some corn pone and 
fat 'possum, and I made a square meal. I was nearly 
famished, as I had had scarcely anything to eat for 
three days but a few green peanuts. Just before day 
he made me a nest up in the loft of the old cabin, and 
I crawled in and slept nearly all day, which greatly 
rested and refreshed me. With the return of strength 
my courage all came back, and I was now ready to 
face any danger to reach the goal of my ambition — 
the Mississippi. 

" I hoped to reach the river that night, as it was now 
only a few miles away, and even thought of the possi- 
bility of finding the gun-boats and getting to the end 
of my terrible march before the dawn of another day. 
But I was fully aware of the difficulties I might have 



326 CAHABA. 

to overcome, and knew that the greatest caution was 
necessary, for the country between me and the river 
thoroughly swarmed with Rebel scouts. As soon as 
night ' spread her sable mantle over the earth ' I 
started out and directed my course toward a planta- 
tion about a mile away. It soon commenced to rain 
and got very dark, but I reached the plantation in 
a short time and went to the negro quarters, but 
found them entirely deserted. While I was scram- 
bling around the negro huts it suddenly cleared off 
and the moon came out, making the night danger- 
ously bright for my safety, especially as I saw there 
was a light in the plantation residence. I approached 
the house carefully from the rear, with the intention 
of discovering who the occupants were. I heard 
enough to assure me that several men were there and 
that my safety depended on keeping out of sight. 
The night was now so bright that I did not dare start 
out again, so I crawled under the house to wait till 
darkness favored my onward progress. 

" As soon as the moon went down I made a break 
for the river, which was only about four hundred 
rods away. Here I ran on to some negroes, who 
were greatly surprised when I told them I had just 
come from the house on the plantation, as they 
said there were six Rebel scouts. there. 

" I asked the darkeys about the Union gun-boat, 
and learned that it passed up and down occasionally. 



A UNION GUN-BOAT. 2>'2'J 

and was very likely a few miles down the river at 
that time. After getting all the information I could 
from my colored friends, I thanked them and started 
down the river. I went perhaps a mile, and then 
crawled into the willows under the bank and re- 
mained until daylight. 

"With the first gray streak of approaching day 
in the east, I was up and eagerly scanning the 
river for the long-looked-for gun-boat ; and as soon 
as it was light enough to distinguish objects at 
any distance, I was rejoiced to behold the object 
of my search about two miles away. 

" I have read and heard about the emotions of 
the weary traveller in the desert, scorched with the 
burning heat of a tropical sun, almost blinded 
with the terrible glare of the sand, and parched 
with thirst, when he discovered the green oasis in 
the distance, where he knows he will find pure, 
cold water, shelter from the sun,, and rest and refresh- 
ment, if his strength will only hold out until he 
can reach that one little heavenly spot in the great 
wilderness of death. Such were the feelings that 
now almost overpowered me when I beheld my 
deliverer close at hand — a Union gun-boat flying 
the Stars and Stripes, the one grand and beautiful 
emblem of liberty in the great wilderness of slavery 
through which I had been wandering for so many 
long and weary days. There in the distance was 



328 CAHABA. 

the little oasis I had long looked for, and where 
I knew I could procure rest and refreshments if I 
could only reach it. But it was fully two miles 
away, and it would be madness to attempt to reach 
it in the broad light of day. I could only practise 
patience and hope that the boat would not hoist 
anchor before night. I hardly took my eyes off 
the vessel all day, and from constant watching I 
could almost discern the officers on the deck. In 
the afternoon I could see that the men went ashore, 
and were drilling on the bank. It seemed to me 
the day would never pass. I was so anxious for 
the night to come that every hour seemed a week. 
But the very sight of the dear old flag and 'boys 
in blue ' so near inspired me with hope and courage, 
and I found patience to remain in my concealment 
until evening. 

" Late in the evening a steamboat came down 
the river, and I hailed it. They said it was against 
their orders to land. I told them to wait and I 
would swim out to the vessel ; but for some reason 
they declined to do so, and started off without me. 
As soon as it got dark I commenced working my 
way down the river toward the gun-boat, but the 
travelling was so difficult and I was in such a weak 
and exhausted condition that it was daylight the 
next morning before I reached the point on the 
bank opposite where the gun-boat was anchored. 



UNDER THE STARS AND STRIPES. 329 

I hailed the officer on deck, and told him to send 
a boat after me, as I wanted to get on board. The 
yawl was promptly cleared away, and in a few 
moments I was on board the vessel, a free man 
once more, with the Stars and Stripes waving over 
me — ample assurance of care and protection. My 
emotions completely overcame me, and it was many 
moments before I could tell my story to the kind- 
hearted captain and his sympathizing crew. 

" I was in a truly deplorable condition — my face and 
hands covered with scars and bruises, my clothes only 
a few dirty, tattered rags, and my hair and whiskers 
matted and stiff with gray-back nits. The men 
were all very kind to me, and did everything possible 
for my comfort. The captain told me to go to 
the wash-room, throw my old rags in the river 
and take a good bath, and he would send me some 
clothes. I followed his directions to the letter, and 
by liberal and repeated applications of soap and 
water I soon discovered that I was originally a 
white man. I thoroughly cleaned out my hair and 
whiskers, although the effort to get a comb through 
those matted masses frequently brought tears to 
my eyes ; and when I had completed my toilet 
and donned the handsome suit of clothes sent me 
by the captain, I felt once more like a man and a 
Christian. I went on deck, and was warmly com- 
plimented by the officers and men on my improved 



330 CAHABA. 

appearance. The recital of my adventures since 
escaping from Meridian were eagerly listened to, 
and the kind-hearted officers endeavored in every 
way to make me forget the sufferings I had under- 
gone and enjoy myself while in their company. 
I had quarters with the officers up in the cabin, 
and they improvised a bed for me on a table, so 
that I might sleep with them. Many a pleasant 
hour I spent in that little cabin, and many a drink 
of their cordials I took, in company with the officers, 
to strengthen me, and fit me once more for joining 
my command. 

" On the gun-boat when I arrived were two Rebel 
soldiers who had been guarding us all summer at 
Cahaba. They lived over in Arkansas, and having 
got permission to go home on a furlough, they 
deserted, as they said they could not conscientiously 
longer defend a cause which treated its prisoners 
of war as we had been treated at Cahaba. I sent 
them to my father's home in Illinois with a letter 
of introduction, and they obtained good situations 
with two of our neighbors. One of them was a 
married man, and had his wife with him on the 
o;un-boat when I met them. Among the Illinois 
prisoners at Cahaba was a man named Rea, who 
was given to making 'Fourth of July speeches;' 
and I learned from these two ex-Rebels that his 
eloquence had much to do with their conversion. 



PLEASANT THOUGHTS. 



ZZ^ 



This interesting and practical result is a compliment 
to Rea's eloquence, and I record it with much pleasure. 

" After remaining in my pleasant quarters on the 
gun-boat long enough to 'recruit my shattered forces,' 
I bade my kind friends farewell and went to Memphis, 
where I reported to the general in command. He 
granted me a thirty days' furlough, as I was still 
far from being strong or well. I went home and 
remained a fevv days, but the desire to rejoin my 
comrades was so strong that I could not resist, and 
in less than two weeks I reported to my regiment 
at Bowling Green, Ky. We were soon ordered to New 
Orleans, and from there to Spanish Fort, and took 
part in one of the last battles of the war. 

" And when the last charge had been made, the 
last position taken, and the air was ringing with 
the expiring groans of the moribund Confederacy, 
it was pleasant to think, after all our years of fighting 
and suffering, that the cause for which we had fought 
and suffered, and for which thousands had died, had 
at last triumphed — the Union had been preserved, 
and the old flag once again floated over a reunited 
country, from which the dark blot of human slavery 
had been washed with the blood of unnumbered 
thousands of heroes." 

Having followed these comrades through their 
wanderings, we return once more to the dreary pen 
in which we were still confined. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

EVERY-DAY LIFE AT MERIDIAN "RAIDING" THE CON- 
SCRIPTS DIGGING A TUNNEL THIRTY-NINE ES- 
CAPED ALL RECAPTURED OR KILLED THE MIS- 
FORTUNES OF THE REFUGEES. 

CONSCRIPTS and deserters were daily added to 
the crowd within the stockade, and raids upon 
such were made when it was known that they were in 
possession of clothing or blankets that could be cap- 
tured with the possibility of retaining possession. 
His hard surroundings made every man an Ishmael. 
A common method of securing blankets and clothing 
was to mark those who were well supplied, wait till it 
was known that they were ordered to the front, and 
then "appropriate" their property; blankets, shirts, 
socks — anything was acceptable. The train for the 
Rebel front left Meridian in the morning before day- 
light. During the night preceding men rendered 
desperate by their long sufferings from cold would pass 
near the conscripts sleeping upon the ground or in 
their house, snatch from the sleeping forms their cov- 
ering, or from beneath their heads a bundle contain- 
ing socks, shirts, or drawers, toss them to a comrade 



STEALING BLANKETS AND CLOTHING. 333 

Standing waiting, watching in the darkness, and ere 
the victim could reahze the situation both had dis- 
appeared in the shadow. Then, upon the part of the 
conscript, would be cursing, wrath, and gnashing of 
teeth ; but his fumings would be useless. To find his 
blankets during the night would be an impossibility, 
and before the dawn a guard of Confederates would 
enter the stockade, call the names of those who were 
to pass out, the line would be formed, the command 
" forward " given, the gate would close behind the de- 
parting column of Confederates, and men who had 
not known a night of comfort for weeks would, on the 
following night, wrap themselves in a luxury they had 
not known since their captivity, and those who had 
involuntarily contributed to their comfort might per- 
haps receive a new supply from the Confederate quar- 
termaster or from friends on their arrival at the front. 
But such foragings were not unattended with dan- 
ger to our marauder. Often the Rebels would keep 
one of three or four awake, and when a hand would be 
outstretched to grasp the prey, swiftly would a club 
wielded by a brawny Rebel arm descend upon the 
member with severe effect. One night, in the house 
occupied by the Confederates — fifteen or twenty feet 
from my sleeping-place — a mess of conscripts were 
sleeping on the floor in one corner of the room. 
Word had come into the stockade after roll-call at 
night that a lot of conscripts would be sent away on 



334 CAHABA. 

the morning train. I chanced to awake some time 
past midnight, and saw a little fellow — a member of a 
loyal Kentucky regiment — walk slowly past the corner 
occupied by the conscripts. He stopped and thrust his 
hand into a large crack in the side of the house, in- 
tending to seize something belonging to the con- 
scripts, knowing they would be sent away in the 
morning. But some one was on the alert for any 
such an occurrence, and in a moment the boy drew 
out his hand, uttering in the same moment a cry of 
pain. His arm had been struck with a heavy club, 
and one of the bones of the forearm was broken. 

No one could blame the Confederates for defend- 
ing their property, and certainly there was plenty to 
excuse our men for stealing from them, for nearly all 
had been robbed of all or a part of their personal ef- 
fects, and our men recalled that even the Good Book 
mentions that a people were directed to " borrow of 
their neighbors and repay not." 

When our houses had been built a short time a tun- 
nel was started from one of them situated near the 
stockade, and pushed as fast as possible. Its comple- 
tion required nearly three weeks, although it was only 
about twenty feet long. The reason for such slow work 
is apparent when it is understood that all dirt had to 
be placed in a haversack and carried to the sink ; that 
only two or three had haversacks ; that all work must 
be done in the night ; that a guard was stationed near 



A WAY TO FREEDOM. 



335 



the " sink," who would detect any such business if 
transacted upon any wholesale basis; that our own 
men must be watched as carefully as were the Rebels 
(for though there might be but one in all our number 
who would prove a traitor, that one might become 
acquainted with the project if many were let into the 
secret), and also that the only means of digging was 
with a wooden knife, spoon, or small tin cup. 

At length the tunnel was completed, and we only 
awaited a suitable night in which to make our escape. 
We needed a night with no moon, and, if possible, 
dark and rainy. We had not long to wait, since more 
than one half of all days and nights at that time were 
wet and cloudy. While a few were busy getting a 
number of the boys who could sing to sit near the 
house from which the tunnel was dug, others gathered 
about the place and began telling stories, singing, and 
playing boisterously. 

The scheme was to have quite a large number 
about the house, who should make as much noise as 
possible to draw away the attention of the guards 
from any accidental noise which might be made by 
those who should pass through the tunnel and walk 
away from the stockade ; also by having so many about 
the house a single person could enter it, crawl through 
the tunnel and escape without the detection sure to 
follow if one after another should be seen singly to 
enter the house and not come out again. Such a 



336 CAHABA. 

house, which at its best could not contain more than 
four, would be looked upon with suspicion if a dozen 
or fifteen men should be received with apparent ease. 
At length the " boys " settled down to singing the 
songs so familiar to our soldier life — the " Red, White, 
and Blue," " Star-Spangled Banner," " We are Com- 
ing, Father Abraham," " Columbia, the Gem of the 
Ocean," etc. The guards remarked that " the Yanks 
are having a mighty jolly time to-night ;" but as we all 
seemed in good-humor, no opposition was offered to 
our " enjoyment." More than thirty had entered the 
tunnel and escaped before I could squeeze myself in ; 
so many were anxious to do the same thing, and it 
was so essential we should arouse no suspicion by a 
squabble as to who should go first, that I deemed it 
best to exercise patience. At length I crawled into 
the house and down into the tunnel ; along its 
cramped sides and muddy bottom I dragged myself, 
until there was only two or three feet more to crawl 
through, and I would be out into the open air and 
outside the stockade. The tunnel was jammed full of 
men. In front of me was an Ohio boy ; just before 
him w^as a young Kentuckian, who had just emerged 
into the open air ; behind me was a big fellow from 
Illinois, and between us hardly an inch of space. 
Every nerve was thrilled, every muscle tense ; liberty 
was just ahead of us. The man in front of me had just 
pushed his head outside the tunnel when I heard the 



A GOOD FLAN SPOILED. 



ZZ7 



cry, " Halt! halt !" and the sharp report of a gun. Its 
flash lighted up the tunnel, for it was directly in front 
of us ; the Ohioan stopped and began to crawl back- 
ward, and a reversed action was inaugurated along 
that whole line of creeping men. In a few moments 
I was back in the house, muddy outside and sick at 
heart within. From the Ohio boy ahead I learned 
the cause of our disaster. The Kentuckian was beside 
himself with excitement, and instead of creeping care- 
fully away from the stockade until he should be be- 
yond fear of creating an alarm, as soon as he was fairly 
outside and able to raise himself to an erect posture, 
he stood for a moment trembling with excitement, 
then sprang forward with all possible speed. Of course 
he was instantly seen, ordered to halt, and a bullet 
sent in close proximity to him brought his short but 
brilliant (?) career to a close. Oh, how mad we were 
at the idiot ! Indeed, the fact that he. was brought 
back was some consolation to our disappointed souls. 
That was the last night we slept in " houses." At an 
early hour the following morning, with a storm of 
oaths, we were driven from our houses. An inspection 
of each was made, and when it was discovered that 
one of them served as the entrance to a tunnel, every 
house, built with so much care and under so many 
difficulties, was razed to the ground, and all were 
placed once more upon a common plane — that of cattle 
turned into a muddy, shelterless yard, or corral. 



338 CAHABA. 

During the hour or more in which our men had 
been escaping through the tunnel, thirty-nine men 
passed out and got away from the immediate neigh- 
borhood of the stockade. Of these one or two were 
returned that evening, the guards having at once 
drawn a cordon of men about the prison at a distance 
of several rods. Very early on the following day 
every available man was pressed into service, and 
starting with hounds close to the prison, they sought 
to follow the fugitives. As a result of the first day of 
man-hunting, six or eight of our comrades were re- 
turned to the stockade — tired, hungry, dejected-look- 
ing mortals. Their clothing, only a covering of rags 
when they left us, was, if possible, now even worse 
than before from hard contact with stiff briers and the 
protruding knots of the timber through which they 
fled. 

The second day brought a smalfer number, and for 
a week or two longer a single recaptured captive was 
returned every day or two. 

Of the whole thirty-nine, not one is known to have 
reached our lines, although Grimes, my companion in 
the former flight, was absent three weeks. 

The previous summer, while at Meridian, I had be- 
come acquainted with a Michigan engineer, a man of 
nearly forty years of age, who had passed much of his 
life on the frontier and with surveying parties, and in 
consequence was a thorough woodsman. His name 



UNFORTUNATE GRIMES. 339 

was Grosvenor. Of all who succeeded in getting 
away from the pen, we, who were well acquainted with 
Grosvenor, believed that the probability of his succeed- 
ing was greater than that of any one else ; and when 
day after day passed by and he did not return we felt 
more and more certain of his success. At length, 
however, one of the returning fugitives brought back 
the sad information that he had been drowned in an 
attempt to cross Pearl River. 

Grimes had a most remarkable series of thrilling 
adventures and hardships. He was almost naked 
while in prison, and had no blanket at the time of his 
escape. He succeeded in reaching Black River, 
twelve miles west of Vicksburg. On the west side 
of Vicksburg, at a particular place, for several weeks 
an outpost of Union soldiers had been placed. Their 
position was well known to the Confederates and to 
the colored people of the vicinity. Grimes's acquaint- 
ance with the colored people and their sympathies, 
which was a part of his Southern rearing, led him to 
seek their aid as much as possible, and on the night 
of his capture he had persuaded one of that race to 
guide him to the Federal outpost. Unknown to the 
guide, the Union outpost had been removed during 
the day a mile down the river, and a party of Con- 
federates had been placed on the east side of the river, 
opposite the post deserted by the Union men. The 
negro guided Grimes to a point in sight of the river, 



340 CAHABA. 

and, fearing instinctively for his own safety, bade him 
God-speed and turned back. Caution was a marked 
character of Grimes's nature, and, uttering no sound, 
he stealthily approached the river. It would have 
been possible for him to have forded a greater portion 
if not all of the river. He had entered the river un- 
observed, and had proceeded a short distance, when an 
accident called one of the Confederates to the spot ; 
seeing an unknown person carefully threading his way 
through the cold stream, he commanded him to halt 
or he would shoot him dead. Flight was impossible, 
and a few days later Grimes was back with us. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

NATTY STEWART AXLEY GEORGE ROBINSON SER- 
GEANT NICHOLS SENT BACK TO CASTLE MORGAN. 

NATTY, the member of a loyal Louisiana battery, 
of whom mention was made previously, had near- 
ly reached our lines, when he was discovered one even- 
ing while passing through a dense wood. On the 
following morning hounds were placed on his track, 
and after going eight or ten miles he was overtaken, 
severely injured by the savage brutes, and recaptured in 
a badly crippled condition. He was never positively 
heard from thereafter, and was supposed to have lost 
his life in another attempted escape. 

Stewart Axley, of the Fifty-first Ohio, who had 
been a prisoner for nearly a year, and was on that 
account very poorly clad, was one of the first to pass 
out, and a short distance from the pen fell into the 
company of G. W. Wells, of the Nineteenth U. S. In- 
fantry. Believing that no organized pursuit would be 
begun before the following day, they sought the rail- 
road track leading west to Jackson. The clothing 
of Axley was a tattered shirt without sleeves and a 
threadbare, ragged pair of pants reaching only below 



342 CAHABA. 

the knees. The condition of Wells was but little bet- 
ter. They hoped, when they first started on their road 
to freedom, they could walk at least forty miles the 
first night. Before they had passed over a fifth of that 
distance both were nearly stiffened with cold, and 
only by great exertion could they continue their 
flight. Daybreak found them less than a dozen miles 
away from Cahaba. By stratagem they eluded the 
pursuing dogs, and passed the day most miserably in a 
stack of rye straw. When darkness permitted them 
to resume their journey they were faint with hunger, 
stiff with cold, and so evidently unable to travel until 
refreshed that, on approaching the first farm-house, 
they boldly approached it and asked for food and 
shelter. The owner of the house, a man named 
Doller, was in sentiment a Union man, though not 
until he had become fully convinced of their identity 
did he dare to make known his real feelings. A 
bountiful supper of sweet potatoes, corn bread, and 
fresh pork was placed before them, and never before 
nor since have they been so well pleased with the 
hospitalities of any mansion. Meeting with so hos- 
pitable a reception, they asked and were granted 
permission to sleep upon the floor. A snow-storm 
kept them at that place the next day. 

In confidence the proprietor of the house told them 
during the day of his Union principles, but that his 
son had been conscripted into the Southern army. 



RETURNING TO MERIDIAN. 343 

and was guarding the prisoners at Meridian. From 
personal observation, and from the statements of his 
son, he knew of the miserable condition of the men 
at Meridian ; and reasoning that ordinary humanity- 
demanded their release or some amelioration of their 
condition, or that death would soon effect their re- 
lease, he firmly believed that an exchange must soon 
be made. 

In their almost nude condition, and possessed of so 
small a fund of vitality, he reasoned that at that 
season of the year it would be an impossibility for 
them to reach Vicksburg, and urged them, for the 
double reason of a probable early exchange and their 
condition, to return to Meridian. Carefully considering 
his reasons and the apparent honesty of his motives, 
they at length decided to return with him to that 
place. On the second morning, giving them all the 
yams they could carry, the trio went to the nearest 
railroad station in company with their host, and by 
the first train were returned to us. Returning north- 
ward the following April, Axley was on the Sultana, 
and by the explosion was blown on a piece of the 
boat far out into the river, and, more dead than alive, 
was rescued near Memphis. 

George F. Robinson, of the Second Michigan Cav- 
alry, succeeded in getting over forty miles away, but 
was seen by a woman, who quickly called her pack of 
hounds and overtook him. 



344 



CAHABA. 



What intensely interesting tales were those told 
truthfully by the men brought back to us ! A volume 
could be filled with statements more startling, more 
pathetic than the tales written by the novelist ; but so 
many pages have been devoted to the fugitives from 
Meridian that the experiences of others will not be 
given. 

I must not neglect to mention, as one bright spot in 
our gloomy life at Meridian, the name of Sergeant 
Nichols, Confederate Commissary Sergeant, who sup- 
plied us with our rations of food and wood. 

Sergeant Nichols was a young man of twenty-one 
or twenty-two years, a native of Mississippi, of fair 
education, and the only man I met in the Confed- 
eracy, save young Beach, who ever manifested to me 
the least feeling of sympathy for us in our hard treat- 
ment, and who expressed a desire to ameliorate our 
condition. He, however, had no power to carry into 
effect his good wishes. In conversation with him 
one day, when I was out for rations, he told me that 
he had made up his mind to go to his regiment rather 
than remain at Meridian as commissary for the prison. 
He always seemed ashamed to be compelled to give 
us such poor, scanty rations of meat and such villain- 
ous stuff for meal. But as that was what was fur- 
nished him, he had no choice. As soon as he men- 
tioned going away, giving as his reason that it made 
his heart ache to see us suffering so much when it was 



SERGEANT NICHOLS. 345 

in the power of the proper officers to do so much better 
by us than they were doing, I begged of him not to 
think of going, for he could do us no good by such an 
act, and we should in all probability fall into the care 
of one much worse. It was a pleasant afternoon that 
day, and he and I sat down upon the outside of the 
stockade for a half hour in conversation upon the 
matter. I secured his promise that he would remain, 
though I felt assured that his duty was to him one 
most irksome. He knew as well as we, and so stated 
at that time, that men in charge of prisons very rarely 
had any regard for the welfare or comfort of their 
captives. 

I am sorry to make the statement, but with a desire 
to deal fairly and without prejudice, I must say that 
Sergeant Nichols was the first, last, and only man with 
whom I formed any acquaintance after leaving my 
first guard who gave any evidence of possessing a 
kindly interest in us. 

In the extended conversation with Sergeant Nich- 
ols, I asked him if it was not possible for us to have 
a larger supply of wood, since we were at the edge of 
a dense forest, and our men would gladly do all the 
necessary work in procuring it. " It is no use," he 
said ; " the commander of the prison will not let your 
men out of the prison to do the work, and will not 
spare a larger number of our men to do such labor or 
to guard your men at work. The amount you are 



346 ' CAHABA. 

getting is all 1 can obtain for you. I have tried ear- 
nestly, and know." 

The water at Meridian was simply abominable. A 
hole was dug about six or eight feet deep, and when 
not disturbed for ten or twelve hours would contain 
nearly a foot of surface water. But only early in the 
morning would so much be found. During the whole 
day one man after another would stand in the bottom 
of the well with a tin cup and dip up the water as it 
accumulated. 

Two or three rods away was the " sink," the hole in 
which faeces were emptied from several hundred prison- 
ers. The bottom of the sink, filled with water, was 
on a higher level than that of the well, hence it does 
not require a very strong imagination to note the close 
relationship existing between the water of our well 
and that of the sink, separated by two or three rods of 
light, sandy soil. No prisoner with us ever saw a cup 
of clear, clean, palatable water in Meridian, and the 
quality of the water was an explanation of the severe 
typhoid fever and chronic diarrhoea seen there. 

At length one day, two or three weeks after our 
houses were torn down, we were surprised by being 
told that on the morrow we should be sent to Cahaba; 
and on the following morning we climbed into a lot of 
old rough cars and again went pounding over the worn- 
out road from Meridian to Selma. 

Always in moving us on the cars, except this single 



AGAIN SENT TO CAN ABA. 347 

time, we were told that we were on the way to an ex- 
change depot. For once the usual lie was not told, and 
a most watchful guard was kept over us. On our jour- 
ney — somewhere near Demopolis — the wheels under 
our car became loosened, and at length detached from 
their position. This permitted the front end of the 
car to drop to the road-bed, and a quarter of the floor- 
ing of the forward portion of the car was detached 
from its place. Seats were torn up, limbs and bodies 
bruised, and bones broken. In the confusion George 
Robinson, mentioned above, and an old-time friend 
of his, John Corliss, sprang from an open window and 
started northward. After weeks of weary wandering 
they reached a point within forty miles of our lines, 
when their tracks were discovered and followed by the 
ever-present hounds, those evil geniuses of prison life. 
They were quickly traced, recaptured, and sent to join 
us. 

A few hours after the accident we reached Cahaba, 
and once more the hope-destroying gates of the old 
prison swung open to receive us, and for many of our 
band opened again only to pass comrades bearing out 
their dead bodies. 

For the first few hours after our return we were be- 
sieged by old acquaintances with the questions always 
eagerly asked of men coming from the outside, " Do 
you hear anything about exchange ?" " What do you 
hear about the war }" They had long supposed we 



348 CAHABA. 

were back in the Union lines, and when they were as- 
sured to the contrary, could hardly be convinced that we 
knew as little about the war and the chances for ex- 
change as they themselves did. They were as much 
shut out from the world as if they had been for months 
corked up in an immense jug. 

In a day or two our little band of three hundred had 
amalgamated with the great crowd, had squeezed them 
into closer quarters, had robbed them of a portion of 
their already far too scanty room ; but in other respects 
the daily round of their dreary life went on as before, 

A large per cent of the mugger gang had gone. The 
scarcity of new arrivals gave them little opportunity to 
pursue their fiendish thieving ; their occupation was 
departed from scantiness of material. 

Another cause had robbed their longer residence in 
Castle Morgan of its pleasure, and that other cause 
was the presence of the hated " Big Tennessee." Prob- 
ably not one man in twenty of those in Castle Morgan 
knew to what an extent the presence of " Big Tennes- 
see" was a thorn in their flesh. 

Many of the men we had known in good flesh the 
summer previous were going about now with the 
forms of gaunt greyhounds ; they were not sick — they 
had not been sick at any time ; they had simply drawn 
from their fund of stored-up fatty tissue until it was 
nearly all exhausted. W. H. Peacock, who went into 
Castle Morgan weighing one hundred and ninety-seven 



EFFECTS OF PRISON LIFE. 



349 



pounds, was never sick an hour during his confinement, 
and on his return to our lines tipped the beam at a 
little over eighty pounds. Smith, an Indiana soldier 
who came to Cahaba with our squad in July, 1864, a ro- 
bust, well-fed, plump-looking man, though never sick 
a day, gradually grew thinner and thinner, until, though 
he ate all he received, he resembled the men advertised 
as living skeletons and carried about as the adjunct 
of a menagerie ; and these instances could be multiplied 
by scores. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

COLD WEATHER AT CAHABA CONDITION OF THE MEN — 

IN AN ATMOSPHERE OF GLOOM CONFEDERATE RE- 
PORTS SENT IN TO PRISON RECRUITING FOR THE 

CONFEDERATE STATES ARMY — NOT A SUCCESS. 

RARELY does snow fall in the southern portion 
of Alabama, but the rainfall of the southern ex- 
ceeds that of the northern portion of the State, and 
almost equals that of Florida. More than one half of 
the winter days of 1864 and 1865 were wet or cloudy. 
During many nights mud in the prison would be stif- 
fened by the frost. 

When the fall of rain continued into the night no 
special preparations were made for " beds" in those 
portions of the prison where men were compelled to 
sleep upon the wet ground. When, however, the 
evening promised a cessation of rainfall, dozens of 
busy hands would be seen armed with a chip, a beef 
rib, tin-plate or frying-pan, scraping the mud off from 
the spot of earth where they were accustomed to sleep, 
by courtesy called a bed. After the ground had been 
properly scraped and cleaned off they would curl down 
in squads, five or six in a nest, without anything 



UNTEMPTING BEDS. 35 I 

under or'over them, each hugging the one next in front 
of him in order to keep warm, as hungry, quiet, and 
contented as could be expected ; the soft mud* was 
sometimes gathered in dishes and cast into the sluice- 
box beneath the water-closet, but oftener was heaped 
up in rows beside the untempting beds. 

Often could be seen some man threading his way 
from one part of the prison to another ; and unwilling 
to step into a pile of the heaped-up mud, he would 
place a foot, already muddy, upon the ground so care- 
fully and with so much labor cleaned a few moments 
before ; then a shout or an oath would burst from 
the lips of the " owner" of that particular piece of 
earth, " Get out of that ! that's my bed ;" or, " What 

in are you thinking of to step on to my bed with 

your feet all mud ? I've been scraping that place for 
the last half hour to get a chance to sleep to-night." 

There never seemed to be anything remarkable to 
the observer in hearing the speaker state that he had 
" cleaned the mud off from his bed." It was a com- 
mon occurrence to hundreds of men ; and we had so 
long been treated like impounded vicious cattle, that 
we came to regard such treatment with indifference, 
and hardly worthy of note. True, at times some one 
would remark, " Well, what would I have said a year 
ago if I had been told I would ever come to such a 
state as this T or, " What would my mother do if she 
could look in here and see me ?" 



352 CAN ABA. 

On one occasion two thin-faced, solemn-visaged 
boys had been making these stereotyped remarks, 
when half in soHloquy one exclaimed, " Will the infer- 
nal regions be as bad as this ?" and his ragged, pinched 
companion, without even smiling, answered, " It won't 
be muddy, anyway, and the nights won't be so cold." 

When we entered Castle Morgan, in the summer of 
1864, nearly all the inmates slept upon the ground. 

After several months there were so many inmates 
there was not room on the ground for all to sleep. 
Then large wooden frames were made and several 
tiers of boards spread upon them. This arrangement 
— called by the men " roosts" — allowed men to be 
placed in tiers one above another, each tier capable 
of stowing away twelve to sixteen men. Every 
" roost" then furnished a habitation for sixty to eighty 
men. 

We found a few roosts when we entered the place, 
to which others were added, until, if I remember 
correctly, there were nine in all. This would take 
from the ground about six hundred and fifty men ; 
the remaining twenty-five hundred men always slept 
upon the ground. 

In some respects the roosts were an improvement 
upon the ground, as they were not muddy nor very 
dusty ; but as it allowed of men sleeping and living 
from one to three " thicknesses" above you, and if 
your " bed" should be on the lower tier it would oc- 



''LITTLE EDDIE." 353 

casionally happen that you would receive a baptism 
of water, slops, or something worse from your sick 
neighbor above you, the roosts were not always a 
source of unalloyed pleasure. 

Had our men been well clothed and well fed their 
sufferings from cold would have been less ; but nearly 
all of those who had been longest in Cahaba had been 
captured in the earlier part of the summer, and were 
not provided with clothing or blankets ; and by the 
time winter arrived their shirts were riddled with 
holes and their pants " out" at the knees and seat. 
Though probably no one froze to death outright 
during any night, many were chilled nearly to the 
point of death, and were rescued only by the most as- 
siduous care of their comrades. One of those who so 
narrowly escaped was one who was always called 
" Little Eddie," a mild-mannered, frank-faced boy who 

belonged to the th Indiana Infantry. Eddie was 

a decided favorite with all of our mess, and when, 
one cold morning, we were ordered as usual into the 
southern end of the prison to be counted, we were 
much pained to learn from one of our company that 
Eddie was past the power of speaking, and perhaps 
was breathing his last. As soon as possible we has- 
tened to the part of the prison where Eddie usually 
laid, and found a comrade already there. The patient 
was lying on his side, drawn up into a little bunch, his 
knees nearly against his chest, and his head bent for- 
23 



354 CAHABA. 

ward until it almost touched the knees. An occa- 
sional tremor ran through his frame, and slight groans 
often came from his lips ; but had he been under the 
influence of a powerful narcotic, he hardly would have 
been more stupefied. 

Gathering him in our arms, we bore him out where 
the rays of the winter's sun would fall upon him, and 
borrowing some blankets from our more fortunate 
comrades, we wrapped him in these ; then one friend, 
taking a hand or a foot in his own hands, would brisk- 
ly apply friction for a few minutes, and immediately 
carry the member to some part of his own person. 
Others, opening a small space in the blanket, breathed 
their warm breath directly upon the body ; another 
gave him warm water as hot as it could be swallowed ; 
and at one time six kind, sympathetic friends were trying 
in different ways to coax back the ebbing tide of life. 

It was several hours before the victory was posi- 
tively decided in our favor, and for many weeks poor 
" Little Eddie" dragged himself about, weakened, 
shocked by the severe ordeal through which he had 
passed. 

Some, from frost-bite and chill, suffered the loss of 
the flesh from the toes, and could be observed going 
about with their naked bones attached to the foot, 
held only by tendinous chords — the ligaments that 
bound the bones together ; the number of these un- 
fortunates, however, was small. 



DISTORTED REPORTS. 355 

None save those who have been thoroughly and 
desperate!)'- homesick, entirely discouraged, always 
hungry, at night always cold, can have a clear concep- 
tion of our physical and mental condition during 
the long, dreary, hope-destroying months that for us 
marked the fall, winter and spring of 1864 and 1865. 
Every avenue of escape was most effectually cut otf. 
After our numbers were something over three thou- 
sand, very few prisoners were sent to Cahaba ; we 
could occasionally obtain little glimpses of the prog- 
ress of the war from the new prisoners, so long as 
such were sent to our prison ; but that source of pleas- 
ure at length almost completely ceased. No reports 
of battles in which our arms were victorious were per- 
mitted to enter our gloomy stockade. The press of 
the Confederacy was under a censorship as rigid if not 
as apparent as is the press of Russia to-day. 

Whenever a great battle was fought in which the 
least shadow of an advantage could be claimed for the 
Confederacy, papers full of the bright outlook for 
their cause were sent into the prison ; and when per- 
haps there were good reasons for regarding the arms 
of the Confederacy victorious, the exultations and 
boasts and threats of the Southern press knew no 
bounds. Concerning the truth of these reports, it was 
utterly impossible for us to judge ; hope was overshad- 
owed by fears and despondency, and gloom became a 
part of every man's being. One example will do as an 



356 CAHABA. 

illustration of the distorted reports sent in to us. 
When we heard of the battle of July 2 2d before At- 
lanta, we were told that General Hood had out-gener- 
alled " Old Billy Sherman" completely ; that he had 
surprised and routed his whole army except a small 
portion ; that this small portion, only by the most des- 
perate fighting and with murderous losses, had barely 
saved themselves from annihilation ; that the " brains 
of the campaign," General McPherson, had been slain. 
Some of the Confederate reports stated that he had 
knowingly ridden to death, setting an example to his 
men of the desperate courage he desired them to ex- 
hibit, and which alone he felt could save them from 
destruction. Other Confederate reports stated that 
he sought death rather than meet the execrations 
which he knew would be poured upon his head by a 
nation indignant and exasperated by the foolhardy 
campaign to Atlanta. 

Afterward, again and again, were we told that 
the army of Sherman, as a result of that ' battle, 
stunned, dazed, their guiding spirit (McPherson) 
lost, were huddled like sheep in yards, surrounded 
by the conquering Southrons, who, conscious of their 
power, were biding their time to make a complete 
capture or destruction more certain. 

Now the facts in the case were these : The Union 
loss, July 2 2d, 1864, in the battle before Atlanta, was 
about thirty-five hundred (Lossing), while the Con- 



OPPORTUNITIES OFFERED TO ENLIST. 357 

federates' loss at the same time was nearly three 
times as great ; and their loss in morale was such 
that it was more damaging than the terrible de- 
struction of men. We, however, were never per- 
mitted to know the truth, and only the most 
garbled and distorted statements were printed in 
their newspapers, and copies of such were sent in to 
us for perusal. 

Always following any alleged defeat of the Union 
arms an opportunity was given to the prisoners 
to enlist under the banner of the Confederacy ; 
and though occasionally a man would go outside, 
take the oath of loyalty to the Confederacy and 
join their army, such cases, compared with our 
great numbers and our wretched surroundings, were 
rare indeed. 

Recruits for the Confederate Army were especially 
sought for at other times, as when a severe cold or 
wet season for several days had more than ordinarily 
tested the inflexible will and loyalty of the captives. 
During the fall of 1864, when Lincoln and Mc- 
Clellan were the candidates of their respective parties 
for President, the latter gentleman was looked upon 
by the Confederates as pledged to terminate the 
war by compromise ; this, by them, was understood 
to be the beginning of their recognition as inde- 
pendent States. They hoped the anti-war party of 
the North, by electing their candidate, would, at the 



358 CAHABA. 

polls in November, indirectly accomplish for them 
the object which so far had not been attained by 
their armies in the field. Whether they were wrong 
or right in their estimates is left to the impartial 
student of the history of those dark days. 

On the other hand, should Lincoln be re-elected, 
they rightly prophesied that the war would be con- 
tinued ; and they could not but foresee that his 
election would be an indorsement of his adminis- 
tration, and that new force would be given to the 
cause he represented. The November election at 
length settled all their doubts and destroyed all 
their hopes built upon the possible election of 
General McClellan. 

To us, who had Republican proclivities, the Con- 
federate admiration and love for McClellan was a 
source of amusement. To the few men who es- 
poused the cause of " Little Mac," the decided pref- 
erence for and cordiality of the enemy for their 
idol was a surprise that grew to be an annoy- 
ance. 

Shortly after we learned of the overwhelming 
majority given to Lincoln, a long, cold rain-storm 
settled down upon that portion of the South, and 
continued for a week ; the clothing of nearly all 
the men was in rags, and every drop of falling rain 
chilled them to the very marrow. To the men 
who were compelled to sleep on the wet, muddy 



DRUMMING UP RECRUITS. 359 

ground the period was most trying. Taking ad- 
vantage of the occasion, a Confederate lieutenant 
and two Confederate sergeants one day came into 
the prison to secure recruits for their army among 
the shivering wretches whom they held captives. 
Going to the centre of the prison, the lieutenant 
mounted a box, and in substance addressed his 
hearers as follows : " Men, the election in the North 
is over, and I hardly need tell you what that election 
means to you. It means that there is no hope for 
you to be exchanged so long as there is a regiment 
of men in the South who can fire a gun, for so 
long as we have a regiment of our army left the 
subjugation of the South will be resisted, the war 
will be carried on ; and so long as the war continues 
you will not be exchanged. Again and again has 
our government besought old Lincoln to exchange 
you, man for man, for our men, but of this we have 
now no hope. 

" Your government will not exchange ; for some 
reason they have determined to leave you here to 
die rather than give us back our men for you. 

"Your government has deserted you, and is un- 
worthy any longer of your respect. I am sent here 
by my government to offer you freedom, warm clothes, 
plenty to eat, and good warm barracks to shelter you 
from the storm if you will but swear allegiance to the 
Confederate States and enlist in the Confederate 



360 • CAHABA. 

Army. Gentlemen — " but his words were drowned 
in tlie groans and hisses of his audience ; and while he 
stood, waiting for the interruption to subside, the box 
on which he stood was kicked from under him, and 
seized by a dozen men for kindling wood. Before 
leaving the prison he managed to inform his hearers 
that on the morrow he would return with a body of 
armed men, and accept all who wished to enlist in the 
Confederate Army. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

A COMPANY OF THIEVES AND MUGGERS ENLIST GOOD 

RIDDANCE FRANK STANLEY TAKES THE OATH TO 

SAVE HIS LIFE FOR HIS MOTHER's SAKE. 

PROM PTLY on the morrow the same lieutenant, 
leading a company of armed men, again en- 
tered the Stockade, and marching to a portion of the 
enclosure opposite the gate, halted, while the officer 
addressed the prisoners : " Men, you have had twenty- 
four hours to decide whether you would prefer to stay 
here and pine away your lives for a government that 
has deserted you — a government composed of a lot of 
pampered aristocrats who care nothing for you — or to 
change your allegiance to a government which will 
give you your liberty, give you good, warm clothing 
and plenty to eat." Much more in this strain he con- 
tinued to state, and closed by saying: " If you are will- 
ing to go with us, as we march out just step between 
these two lines of soldiers." About seventy or eighty 
men, composed mostly of the thieves and muggers of 
the prison, accepted the invitation, and passing through 
the gate, were seen by us no more. 

One of the most remarkable phases of prison life 



362 CAHABA. 

was the tenacity and devotion witli which our men 
clung to the cause of the Union. Hearing only the 
garbled and distorted statements of their guards ; 
never permitted to know the true status of the war ; 
listening to the sophistry of their captors — strange, in- 
deed, was it that their manhood was so rarely shaken. 
They seemed to have been so filled drinking at the* 
fountain of loyalty that they fainted not under the 
austerities and hardships that were never absent in 
the long and weary months of their incarceration. A 
few Northern soldiers who entered prison with much 
respect for the Confederacy and its principles 
changed their opinions after seeing our intensely 
crowded condition, after feeding upon the wretched 
food, drinking the polluted water, and shivering with 
cold for months in a country one of the most densely 
wooded of the whole South. True, there were some 
Northern soldiers who had given previous to their 
capture little thought to the object of the South in 
seceding, and less to the subject of enlisting in the 
service of the Confederac}^ Like persons born and 
nurtured within the pale of some religious bodies, they 
regarded themselves as right, and gave little study to 
the principles of their opponents. A short residence, 
however, in this Alabama summer (and winter) resort 
occasionally led such to consider both their own fun- 
damental political creeds and that of the enemy. The 
result was that men who had been cool or lukewarm 



LOYAL TO THE UNION. 363 

became positively " hot." Not that the tenets of the 
new government or those of the old were modified a 
jot by their incarceration; but the opinions of the men 
captured certainly were. Let it not be understood 
that every ragged, dirty, vermin-eaten, shivering wretch 
to whom a proposition of Confederate enlistment was 
made would at once pour forth with wild vehemence 
a philippic against the Confederacy, or with noble dig- 
nity deliver a Websterian oration, quoting " Liberty 
and Union, one and inseparable ;" but their willingness 
to endure the discomforts of body and distress of 
mind, overclouded as they were by the uncertainty as 
to how long their hopeless imprisonment might con- 
tinue, should compare favorably with patriotic utter- 
ances the most thrilling, when it is remembered that a 
Confederate recruiting officer was always near by, was 
always ready to place their names upon his roll, guar- 
antee them warm clothing, an abundance to eat, a 
service in some strong Confederate fort supplied with 
barracks that would shed off the falling rain and 
shelter them from the raw, sleety winds of a Southern 
winter, and permit them when off duty to sleep in a 
room comfortably heated by a stove. 

Few persons ever more anxiously dwelt upon and 
earnestly desired the comforts that were offered them. 
None ever more peremptorily spurned them. 

The other reason why so few men enlisted from our 
number into the ranks of the enemy was the extreme 



364 C AH ABA. 

bitterness, the fury that such an act aroused among 
their loyal comrades, and a fear by those who would 
be willing to desert lest their intentions should be 
discovered and they be subjected to the hardest 
treatment before they could be taken outside of the 
stockade. 

If it was known that a comrade intended to "go 
outside" and take the oath, he would certainly be 
beaten, knocked down, and cuffed until he could ob- 
tain the protection of a guard. This was not always 
possible ; and woe betide him whose wish to take the 
oath became known, and who could not obtain for the 
time the protection desired. 

Usually, when a comrade desired to " go outside," 
he took an officer of the prison a little way aside, and 
told him he wanted to talk with him privately. This 
was so common in legitimate matters as not to be re- 
garded with suspicion. As soon as possible he was 
conducted out, and was never seen in prison again, 
unless he wished to get some little thing of value left 
behind ; then he would return to the prison at once, 
quietly obtain the articles desired, and shortly be called 
out, nominally for some other cause, but really to join 
the Confederate Army. 

I have seen men shiver all night in their scant 
clothing, and, unable to sleep from the cold, would 
doze during a portion of the day ; and if you would 
mention to them that they could take the oath and 



FRANK STANLEY. 



565 



have warm clothing and plenty of food, they would fly 
into a rage, and perhaps deal a stunning blow to the 
person who suggested the idea, deeming themselves 
grossly insulted. 

Some, however, swore allegiance to the Confed- 
eracy who were as loyal as any soldier living, but who 
embraced this opportunity as affording them better 
facilities for escape, or because it gave them the only 
chance remaining to live. One such person was Frank 
Stanley, a young man of nineteen years, whose wid- 
owed mother lived near Chicago, 111. 

One day Frank came to me and said he wanted to 
talk with me in confidence ; so we went to a part of 
the prison where we could be a few feet away from all 
others, and sat down. I had known the boy ever 
since I was first a prisoner at Cahaba, and had learned 
to esteem him as a person of intelligence, good prin- 
ciples — a generous, big-hearted fellow who had left 
college to enter the Union Army. He had, at the 
time of his enlistment, two brothers in the army, but 
previous to his capture one had been killed at Vicks- 
burg and the other had died of some camp disease at 
Memphis. Frank was the only child now left to his 
mother, and as they were very dear to each other, 
he often moaned that his mother should be kept 
in suspense as to his fate. His shirt had become com- 
pletely worn out ; his pants were torn off at the knees 
— perhaps used to bind the sores of some comrade ; his 



366 CAHABA. 

hat was without a rim ; his shoes were only a thing 
of the past, and he had had no blanket since his 
capture. 

When I first knew him he was in good flesh and 
excellent spirits, but had a slight diarrhoea. The 
scanty food, the raw, cold nights passed in shivering, 
and the days and weeks of uncertainty had made his 
limbs and body spare and his face more angular than 
when we first came together. 

With hesitation, showing by his manner that 
upon his mind was a subject repulsive to him, he 
told me that he had nearly decided to " take the 
oath" to the Confederacy and^ enter the Rebel 
army. Said he : "You know what the result will 
be before many months, if I remain here that long ; 
and by this step there is a probability of my life being 
prolonged until I can escape to the Union lines. I 
have seen my comrades carried out of here one by one, 
and it is only a simple question in subtraction that 
decides when my time will come. I have no clothing, 
my health is getting poorer, and the weather is getting 
more and more inclement. My mother has already 
lost two boys, and I am the only one left to aid her in 
her old age. Now, when I go out, and the 'boys' 
whom I have learned to respect know that I have 
taken the oath and curse me as a traitor, won't you 
tell them that I hate the Confederacy, and only take 
this course as a means of saving my life .? I will desert 



FRANK'S GOOD TRAITS. 367 

at the first opportunity, and I wish I could annihilate a 
Confederate for every word uttered in taking the 
oath." 

I could not ask him to change his determination. I 
saw as clearly as he what it meant for him to attempt 
to remain in prison during the whole cold, wet winter; 
and when a few days after he slyly pressed my hand 
before he went out, I cheered him with the assurance 
that I would do the same thing were I in his circum- 
stances. In many particulars Frank was a remarkable 
boy. He was a person possessed of rare conversa- 
tional power, and with the few with whom he became 
intimate it was often a delicious treat to listen to 
his good ideas clothed in rich, captivating language. 

An anxiety and sympathy and love for his widowed 
mother, that was beautiful in its tenderness, often 
showed itself in his remarks ; and, too, his mother 
must have been a noble person, for his frequent quo- 
tations of the precepts she had impressed upon him — 
had made a part of him — mirrored a refined nature 
and an intellect of much power. 

Another marked characteristic of the boy was his 
strong, unselfish patriotism. Patriotism may be in- 
nate ; the tiny germ may have been implanted in the 
soul of the being at its creation ; but certain it is 
the attribute is so moulded by environment that, like 
conscience, it is largely a creature of education. It 
is the result of thought, of appreciation of the beauties. 



368 CAHABA. 

the benefits, the lofty principles, the virtues of one's 
country. 

I have listened to effusions delivered at latter-day 
camp-fires, in which the patriotism of the volunteer in 
the Rebellion was painted as always of the highest, 
purest, and most noble character ; but a moment's con- 
sideration of the subject will convince any one that 
patriotism is the creature of instinct and intelligence, 
and is nobler in proportion as the element of intelli- 
gence preponderates. The studies of Frank, his edu- 
cation, his home life, the teachings of his sensible par- 
ents, his college life, had rendered his love of country 
a strong passion, which influenced every important act 
in his military experience ; and, like the vast majority 
of those who suffered with him, his patriotism was in- 
tensified by the misfortunes of his captivity. His in- 
tellect was one of uncommon activity, and his 
thoughts were those of men of mature age. Possessed 
of strong convictions, his earnestness made more last- 
ing the thoughts that flowed from his lips as easily 
as water flows from the fountain. Many of the sub- 
jects he used to discuss with a charm rarely excelled 
have passed from memory ; but in later years I have 
often recalled his foreshadowing of the G. A. R. and 
the Loyal Legion, the latter of which would have 
been painful to his observation. 

In his college days he had been a member of a col- 
lege society, and recalling the fact as he sat in collo- 



FERVID PREDICTIONS. 369 

quy with a few friends one day, he remarked : " When 
the war is over there will be an organization of those 
who shall survive this war for the Union, whether we 
are to be victorious or defeated. A motive similar to 
that which leads men who have been associated in col- 
leges to form societies commemorative of their efforts 
will lead our survivors to form similar societies. What 
a glorious order it will be — how strong the bond of 
union between men who have welded their friendship 
in the hot flames of battle ! The distinctions of rank 
that war makes a necessity between men otherwise 
equals let us hope will never appear there. Some 
might urge as a reason for two separate societies — one 
of officers, the other of privates — that the commissioned 
men would be more careful of their membership ; but 
it would be as practicable to exclude objectionable men 
from one society as from the other. 

"There is no natural line of demarcation that should 
in civil life be drawn by any society between our re- 
spectable comrades. In the North to-day earnest, un- 
selfish men beseech civilians to enlist, without regard 
to rank or remuneration. Rightly they place the 
duty of service to our country above mercenary con- 
sideration or pride in title. There is too much at stake 
to let rank influence our actions to-day; and these 
pleadings of to-day should not be forgotten in the 
future. 

" But a strong objection against two societies would 
24 



370 CAHABA. 

be that they would tend to perpetuate a class feeling 
that should be obliterated as soon as possible, when 
the classes are no longer necessary. 

"A society based upon rank savors too much of 
caste to flourish in Democratic America ; it would be at 
home in India, it might meet with favor in monarchi- 
cal countries, but it should never become acclimated 
and feel at home in the United States — certainly not 
as an outgrowth of our armies, into which so many 
men have entered from motives of pure patriotism, 
and with no thought or selfish consideration for the 
wages and comforts that rank could give. The only 
prerequisite for admission to that society should be 
the fact that those who shall seek fellowship be repu- 
table men, and stood shoulder to shoulder with us in 
the struggle that shall win or lose the most precious 
inheritance of humanity, the last hope of a free gov- 
ernment that may come to mankind. Doubtless 
there will be organizations composed only of men of 
a single Department. The Army of the Potomac, 
and Sherman's army, and men who have been prison- 
ers, may be branches of the main body, but never sep- 
arated from it — one never better or more exclusive 
than another. Any distinctions founded upon rank 
now held would only keep alive a feeling natural to 
men who have entered the army as we have — a feel- 
ing inimical to fraternity." 

Poor Stanley ! what his fortunes, what his fate, is a 



FRANICS FATE UNKNOWN. 



Zl"^ 



sealed book ; no word ever came in after years regard- 
ing him. Whether he attempted to escape and was 
recaptured and executed ; whether he was captured by 
our own army before he could escape ; whether he died 
wearing Confederate gray or lived to reach home and 
died, or lived, perhaps may never be known by those 
who remember him with more than an ordinary inter- 
est ; but this is certain, those who knew him well will 
recall him as a soldier of a high type, and one whose 
circumstances in advance pardoned his action. 

In 1887 an Indiana soldier who had enlisted into 
the Confederate Army from Andersonville applied 
for a pension ; he offered as a reason for his having 
enlisted in the Confederate Army that he feared 
death from hardships if he should remain in the 
prison, and that by enlisting he might escape to 
our army. He succeeded in making his escape, re- 
turned to his own regiment, and did good service 
during the remainder of the war. It was decided 
by the Pension Bureau that the fact of his volun- 
tarily enlisting, while he was a Union soldier, to 
bear arms against the United States, constituted 
him a deserter, notwithstanding the causes which led 
to it, the expressed determination to return to his 
own regiment, and the fact of his having done so ; 
and he was thereby debarred from the rights he other- 
wise would have had. 

Men who, twenty-three years ago, thought no indig- 



372 CAHABA. 

nity too severe to inflict upon those who were will- 
ing to " take the oath " to the Confederacy feel 
less vindictive to-day toward those who did so solely 
for the selfish purpose of saving their lives for them- 
selves ; and I aver the ruling of the Pension Bureau 
would not meet the approval of the men who, from 
personal experience and observation, knew the wretch- 
ed surroundings and the higher motives of such men 
as the Indianian named or the noble boy, Frank 
Stanley. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

SERGEANT OWENS — ESCAPES AND IS RECAPTURED BE- 
GINS A TUNNEL TEDIOUSNESS OF THE TASK. 

THAT men in such a place and with such gloomy 
prospects should constantly think of plans by 
which they might regain their liberty would be but 
natural, even if they were of the most meek and 
submissive kind ; but that men who had been cap- 
tured, as had so many of those in Confederate prisons, 
under circumstances that stamped them as the 
bravest, the most daring and reckless, should chafe 
and fret and plot for freedom, would be inevitable. 
Every point about the prison was studied from all 
directions by hundreds of men anxious to find some 
weak spot that might offer even a possibility of 
escape. 

Why should they not seek to fly from a place 
so dreary and hope-destroying ? The days were wet 
and gloomy, the nights were dark and cold ;[ hunger 
was ever present ; melancholy hung over us like a 
spectre from the realms of Pluto. 

Such surroundings could bring to our comrades 
but two results : in one class they slowly crushed 



374 CAHABA. 

out every hope ; in another they awakened resolutions 
of a most desperate character. 

Among those of the latter class was a sergeant of 
an Ohio regiment named Owens, who had, before 
entering the army, resided at Sandusky. The history 
of Owens before coming to Castle Morgan I have 
never been able to learn, and since the war he was 
last heard from at St. Louis, Mo. 

Owens, some time in the fall of 1864, had arrested 
the attention of the prison officials, and for some at- 
tempted escape had been taken out from the prison 
to the shop of the village blacksmith, and on his legs 
heavy iron shackles were riveted. 

The shackles, like those fastened upon Grimes 
when we were brought back after our recapture in 
August, were " home-made," the workmanship of an 
unskilful artisan, rough and unwieldy, composed of 
but two links, each about fifteen inches long, and two 
rings to encircle the ankles. To rivet together the 
two parts of the rings about his ankles, it was neces- 
sary for him to stand upon the anvil. By tying a 
string to the links, where they were united, Owens 
could walk slowly and painfully about the prison, 
heralding his footsteps with the continual " clank, 
clank " that warned the guards of his approach, 
and taught them to regard him as a man of desperate 
purposes. 

But for only a short time did the sergeant wear his 



THE ESCAPE OF SERGEANT OWENS. 375 

fetters continuously. With a knife, the edge of which 
had been changed to a rude saw, he carefully cut the 
rivets so they could be removed and his shackles laid 
aside. As soon as darkness came he would remove 
his fetters and wander about the prison, examining, 
over and over again, its every portion. At last he 
decided to attempt an escape through the top of the 
water-closet. The water-closet, as has been mentioned 
elsewhere, was a room built against the side of the 
prison, having a doorway between the prison and the 
closet. The walls, floor, and cover of the water-closet 
had been made of unseasoned two-inch planks. 

As the planks became dry they shrank, leaving 
wide cracks into which it was possible to push 
the fingers far enough to gain a strong hold. 
Noticing this, Owens waited for a favorable oppor- 
tunity. 

On the night following the Presidential election in 
November, 1864, a fierce thunder-storm visited Cahaba. 
It was such an occasion as the sergeant had desired. 
Freed from his shackles, he passed into the water- 
closet. A guard was stationed at the door of this 
closet at all times ; it was his duty to notice every 
person who might pass him, and to see that no one 
attempted escape at that point. A comrade engaged 
the attention of the guard by offering for sale a pair 
of shoes. The mechanical productions of the Con- 
federacy were less neat and attractive than those of 



376 CAHABA. 

the Northern States, and the superior workmanship 
of the Northern soldier's article, offered for sale, at- 
tracted the Confederate, and awakened his cupidity. 
Anxious to possess them, he forgot his duty, and for 
many minutes permitted his attention to be drawn 
away. 

The sergeant pushed his fingers into the cracks be- 
tween the planks, and hurriedly climbed up the side 
of the room to the roof Loud peals of thunder and 
a heavy fall of rain drowned the noise that would 
have attracted the attention of the guard on a stiller 
night. A plank from the roof was carefully pushed 
from its place, and through the opening thus made 
he escaped to the upper side of the roof; the plank 
was replaced, and Owens dropped to the ground. 
The stockade was only a few feet away, but a walk 
had been built near its top, on the outside, and armed 
sentries were stationed there, with orders that portend 
death to an escaping prisoner. The night befriends 
him ; the inky darkness shuts him out from the vision 
of the guards, while he watches their dim forms placed 
between him and the sky. A favorable opportunity 
presents itself; the face of the nearest guard is turned 
away for a few moments, and risking limb and life, the 
sergeant stealthily climbs up the inside of the stock- 
ade, carefully steps upon the walk of the guards, 
suspends his body beneath it, hanging with his 
hands for a moment, and drops lightly to the ground. 



IN FEAR OF BLOODHOUNDS. 377 

He has aroused no suspicion, and tlie greatest 
difficulty has been surmounted. Two or three rods 
away is the Alabama River ; stealing carefully away 
from the stockade, he reaches the river-bank and 
plunges in ; the current carries him below the town, 
and after a long struggle in the cold water he reaches 
the eastern shore. 

His objective point is Nashville, and at once he 
starts northward. He fears the hounds may be placed 
upon his track, and after a few miles he plunges into 
the river again and swims to the western bank, a 
few miles farther on. Determined, if possible, to throw 
the dogs from his track, he swam the Alabama the 
third time, and at daybreak sought shelter in a dense 
wood. 

The heavy rain and his repeated crossings of the 
river have obliterated all traces of the course which 
he has taken, and he can now pursue his journey with 
little fear of pursuit, guarding only against the dangers 
before him. He had continued his flight several 
nights, subsisting sometimes upon food gathered in 
the fields, sometimes confiding in the negro slaves, 
and obtaining food from them. Laying by a portion of 
the day, and travelling only through the woods, he 
travelled onward. Compelled by circumstances, he 
was sometimes forced to make a meal of raw peanuts 
that had only recently been gathered. On one occa- 
sion this indigestible food gave him a severe colic, 



378 CAHABA. 

and to seek relief from the pain he went to the house 
of a negro slave, situated near the residence of the 
planter. Here he was discovered and captured by the 
planter, and returned by rail to Cahaba, where he 
was recognized by the prison authorities as the rest- 
less captive whom they had placed in irons a few 
weeks previous. Again he was manacled, this time 
more securely than before, and returned to the com- 
mon prison, where he was more closely watched than 
ever. 

Those by whom Owens was intimately known rec- 
ognized in him a person of superior intelligence, 
ability, and courage, but to the masses he cared little 
to unbosom himself, and by these, as he moved with 
discomfort about the crowded prison, moody in 
manner and distinguished by his fetters from the 
majority of his companions, he was regarded as a 
fanatic, possessed wifH a mania to escape, and not a 
few spoke of him among themselves as " Crazy 
Owens." This cognomen, as will appear at a later 
period of our story, was most damaging to his influ- 
ence at a critical hour, in the height of an insurrection 
organized by the prisoners. 

Shortly after his return he gathered a few trusted 
companions about him, and sought freedom by tunnel- 
ling. On the east side of the prison, inside of the 
brick wall, but within ten or fifteen feet of the stock- 
ade, was a small room used by the Confederates, some- 



BEGINNING A TUNNEL. 379 

times for a guard-house for their own soldiers and 
sometimes as a commissary room, in which meal was 
placed. The floor of this room was about two feet 
higher than the floor of the common prison. A door 
opened from this room to the common prison, and 
when there were either Confederates confined in the 
guard-house, or commissaries placed there for safe- 
keeping, a Confederate was placed at the door. The 
wall of the room was brick, and through the wall, be- 
side the door, below the level of the doorstep, was a 
small opening for ventilation of the space beneath the 
guard-room floor. To Owens the possibility of get- 
ting under the guard-house floor and beginning a 
tunnel suggested itself This plan he confided to Ira 
Collins, of the One Hundred and Fourteenth Illinois, 
and Alfred Dodd, a drummer-boy of the Ninety-third 
Indiana, and four others. Dodd was a very small boy, 
and the only one who could easily pass through this 
hole in the brick wall. Collins stole a sack from the 
commissary to be used for carrying the dirt dug out 
of the tunnel. As soon as it was dark enough for 
them to begin their work, three or four of the seven 
in the scheme would throw blankets over their 
shoulders and approach the guard at the door of 
the guard-room, standing in such a position as to 
obstruct his view of the little opening through the 
wall near the guard-room door. This awakened 
no suspicion in the mind of the sentinel, as it was 



380 CAHABA. 

common for the prisoners to converse with guards on 
the inside of the prison. This intercourse between 
captor and captive was as much desired by guards as 
by prisoners. The Northern men often brought into 
prison articles that had become scarce in the South, 
and an exchange of such articles for tobacco, sweet 
potatoes, " goobers " (peanuts), or wheat bread was a 
pleasure to the Confederate and a necessity to his 
captive. If the Yankee had nothing to exchange to 
gratify his physical hunger, he could allay his thirst 
for news of the war by rumors retailed by the sen- 
tinel. If the sentinel was a stanch Confederate it 
was a gratification to him to repeat the stories of 
Confederate victories always published in the journals 
of " Dixie." If, however, he had been unwillingly 
forced into the Confederate service, he experienced a 
melancholy pleasure in listening to the sentiments so 
often uttered by the men whom he unwillingly held 
in duress. To the plotters it mattered little what the 
sentiments of the guard might be, so that his attention 
was drawn from the opening through which Dodd 
passed to and from his dangerous work. As soon as 
the drummer-boy observed his comrades in position 
to screen him from the observation of the sentinel, he 
crawled through the little opening, and with a knife 
and tin dish began to work upon his tunnel. 

Into the bag furnished by Collins he would place 
a few quarts of dirt, and carefully pass it out to a 



A NEW SCHEME. 38 I 

comrade, who, secreting it under his blanket, would 
bear it to the water-closet, and pour it through the 
" seat " into the stream of water below, where it was 
carried beyond the stockade and into the Alabama. 
When the sack was filled again, another comrade 
would secrete it beneath his blanket and repeat the 
action of his predecessor. Prudence required that the 
work should be divided between all, lest the frequent 
entrance to the water-closet of the same person should 
awaken the suspicions of a vigilant sentry. The prog- 
ress of the work was slow, and before its completion 
another scheme for the liberation of all the inmates of 
Castle Morgan, originating with another prisoner, 
overshadowed this, and at length led to its abandon- 
ment. The originator of this new scheme was Hiram 
Solon Hanchette, a captain in the Sixteenth Illinois 
Cavalry. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

CAPTAIN HANCHETTE PERSONAL APPEARANCE AND 

HISTORY ENTRANCE TO CASTLE MORGAN SUG- 

j GESTS a PLAN FOR ESCAPE HIS LIEUTENANTS 

MART BECKER CULP COLLINS — RUSH. 

CAPTAIN HANCHETTE had been captured 
about November 23d, 1864, in company with 
a small number of men belonging to the brigade of 
Colonel Horace Capron. At the time of his capture he 
was Acting Assistant Adjutant-General of the brigade. 
Capron's Brigade was then scouting on the Waynes- 
boro Pike, twenty miles from Columbia, Tenn., and an 
equal distance from any support. Here it was briskly 
attacked by Forrest's cavalry and lost thirteen men 
captured ; among these were Captain Hanchette and 
several wounded. That a true history of Captain 
Hanchette's connection with the insurrection, and a 
just estimate of the character of the man himself, 
might be given, the author, to add to his personal 
knowledge, has sought information from many 
sources. 

Previous to enlistment, he was an attorney, practic- 








CAPT. H. S. IIANCHETTE. 



CAPTAIN HANCHETTE. 383 

ing law at Woodstock, McHenry County, 111. From 
that place he entered the United States service, being 
commissioned a captain in Company M. The date of 
his enlistment was November 4th, 1862; the date of 
his commission as captain was May 19th, 1863. He 
was promoted and commissioned as major December 
2 1 St, 1864, to rank as such from June 8th, 1864. 
His promotion then was given him three or four 
weeks after his capture, and for that reason he was 
never mustered in as a major. This fact explains 
why by some of his acquaintances he is spoken of as 
a captain and by others as a major. 

At the time of his entrance to Castle Morgan, he 
presented the appearance of a person in the full ma- 
turity of manhood. His age was thirty-nine years ; 
his height was five feet seven and one half inches; hair 
dark, but thin on the crown ; eyes dark, searching, and 
intelligent ; skin clear and ruddy ; face clean-shaven. 
His form was compact and betokened much physical 
strength. In speech his words were not profuse, but 
left an impression upon those who observed him 
closely, and he possessed a reserved power ready to 
be used when an occasion of sufficient importance 
should call it forth. He inspired those with whom he 
was associated in the plot for insurrection with an un- 
questionable confidence in hjs manly courage and 
almost superhuman boldness. By them he is remem- 
bered as one who, after carefully weighing a fearful 



384 CAHABA. 

responsibility, was willing to assume it, if there was a 
reasonable probability that by so doing the condition 
of his comrades might be bettered ; and a few weeks 
after his capture, when the attempt at the liberation of 
his imprisoned companions had been made and had 
failed, he rendered the name of " Solon Hanchette " 
forever glorious by positively refusing to ameliorate 
his own punishment by betraying the identity of his 
associates. Some intelligent persons have conjectured 
that he was willing to be captured. It has been as- 
serted that he had long contemplated, while doing 
duty in the field, a project for the liberation of the 
prisoners in the crowded camps of the Confederacy. 
There is no foundation for such an opinion ; but, on 
the other hand, there is positive testimony that he de- 
termined never to enter a large prison if it could be 
avoided. 

He remained with the little squad from Capron's 
Brigade for three or four days, and to one of them — 
Ezra C. Spencer, of the Eighth Michigan Cavalry — he 
expressed his determination to escape at the earliest 
possible opportunity. A cordial friendship sprang up 
between Hanchette and Spencer from the first, and an 
informal compact was entered into between them, 
that so long as they were permitted to remain to- 
gether the two should be partners in any attempt at 
escape. 

After a few days Captain Hanchette was separated 



STRIVING TO. ESCAPE. 385 

from Spencer and his comrade, and the two did 
not meet again until they arrived at the prison at 
Meridian, Miss. In the mean time the Confederates 
had captured some steamboats on the Cumberland 
River, the crews of which were citizens, and placed 
these citizens in the same prison with Captain Han- 
chette. No possibility of escape came to the captain, 
so carefully was the collection of prisoners guarded, 
and believing that the chances of getting away and 
returninofto his command would be more difficult with 
each move into the Confederacy, without losing sight 
of his first determination, he decided to avail himself 
of another possible way to freedom. In the phrase of 
archery, he determined to " add another string to his 
bow." He reasoned that citizens would not ordinarily 
be held as prisoners of war, and believing that the citi- 
zen crews of the boats would be soon returned to 
our lines, he exchanged his officer's clothing for a citi- 
zen's suit, shaved off his heavy brown mustache, and 
assumed the role of a civilian captured on a boat. 
His vigilance, however, was never for a moment re- 
laxed, his eyes and ears were always open, his muscles 
always ready to grasp any opportunity, or to spring 
for the liberty that might present itself even for a 
moment. Four weeks later found him at Meridian, 
but so changed by the loss of his mustache and shabby 
suit of citizen's clothing that he was with difficulty 
recognized by Spencer. Here, on Christmas eve, sit- 
25 



386 CAHABA. 

ting by their little fire in the stockade, at Meridian, 
while a drizzling rain saturated their garments, the 
two men recounted their experiences while separated 
and together discussed the plans for escape that seemed 
most feasible. Early in January all Northern prison- 
ers, civil and military, were removed from Meridian to 
Cahaba, and but a few days had elapsed before Han- 
chette had matured a plan that was intended to release 
not only himself, but every prisoner held at Castle 
Morgan. The nearest point where Union troops were 
stationed was at Pensacola, Fla., distant from Cahaba 
on a straight line less than a hundred and fifty miles. 
In the plan of Captain Hanchette this was to be the 
objective point. At Selma, less than ten miles north, 
was a Confederate arsenal containing enough arms 
to fully arm every Union soldier confined in Castle 
Morgan, and as much artillery as could be used. The 
strip of country between Selma, Cahaba, and Pensa- 
cola had never been overrun by the armies of either 
the Union or the Confederacy, and it was reasonable 
to suppose that it was abundantly stocked with mules 
and horses to mount all who were able to ride, and 
contained enough vehicles to transport all of the sick 
who were not too ill to be transported. The country 
about Cahaba had been settled for over forty years, 
and was one of the richest in the State. From it, it 
was intended to collect enough food and forage to 
supply the refugees until they could reach their 



A DESPERATE PROJECT. 387 

friends. There were very few troops in the vicinity of 
the prison or at Selma. All the cavalry in the State 
was in its northern and eastern portion, so" far away 
that many days must necessarily be consumed before 
they could overtake the fleeing captives. A small 
number of Confederate infantry might be spared from 
Mobile, but these would not equal in numbers the 
men from Cahaba, and many hours, perhaps days, 
would elapse before they could push out to intercept 
them. These were the considerations which Han- 
chette presented to his companions, as he sought their 
co-operation in the contemplated plot for liberty. 
His plan, briefly outlined, was to capture the prison 
guard and their battery, march to Selma and arm all, 
then march overland to Pensacola, taking from the 
arsenal at Selma, in addition to guns and rifles and 
small arms, enough artillery to give that arm of the 
service a proper representation in the brigade to be 
formed from the released captives. It was believed 
that enough horses could be captured between 
Cahaba and Selma and in the vicinity of Selma to 
furnish the animals necessary to draw the guns and 
caissons. With these provided, small parties, headed 
toward Pensacola, could gather in enough horses to 
furnish a respectable contingent of cavalry, if not 
mount all able-bodied men, and enough vehicles to 
carry all who were unable to walk, and feed for men 
and animals. As Cahaba and Selma were on the 



388 CAHABA. 

west side of Alabama, and Pensacola was on the 
east of that river, a crossing should be made, probably 
best done at Selma, as a ferry-boat was always at that 
place. Several large steamboats were used in navi- 
gating the Alabama, and should by chance one or 
more of these be captured at Selma, they could be 
utilized in carrying the prisoners more than half the 
distance toward the Florida town. It was thought 
that a few men, well mounted and exchanging horses 
at plantations where convenient, could ride through to 
Pensacola, inform the commander there, and have a 
detachment of mounted men sent out to meet the 
fugitives on their way, and aid them in their flight. If 
the Union captives could overpower and capture the 
small guard at Cahaba, and a hundred men could 
hurry on to Selma and gain a foothold there, they 
had every reason to believe that success would crown 
their efforts. If lives were sacrificed in the undertak- 
ing, the loss might not exceed the deaths that would 
result from remaining confined at Castle Morgan. 
After a careful consideration of all the elements enter- 
ing into the totality of the project, the probable small 
number of Confederates at Selma and vicinity, the 
small amount of troops that could be sent against 
them from other parts of the State, if the highway were 
passable, the few days that might reasonably be ex- 
pected to suffice for them to reach Pensacola, and, 
on the other hand, the certainty that no release, ex- 



GOOD REASONS FOR THE SCHEME. 389 

change, or parole could come to them till the close of 
the war ; the possibility, yea the probability, judging 
from the meagre information to be gathered only 
from the Southern papers, that the contest would be 
prolonged through another summer; the certainty that 
the death-rate in this prison (crowded as it was far be- 
yond any other prison in the South) would in the fol- 
lowing summer exceed any mortality known in the 
history of prisons — all these considerations, in the 
opinion of the writer, placed the scheme among those 
that are based upon good reasons, and such as would 
have received the encouragement of prudent, energetic 
military men. The legal education of Captain Han- 
chette made him fully aware that the repudiation of 
his military rank and the pretense of being a citizen 
was a violation of the most firmly settled rules of war, 
and the fact of discovery would almost certainly lead 
his captors to inflict some form of punishment. But 
in extenuation and apology for this act of his, it should 
be remembered that deception within certain limits is 
one of the arts of war. 

While it is probable that the authorities of either 
army would feel compelled to publicly rebuke such 
a violation of the rules of war as was committed 
by Captain Hanchette, there is little doubt that 
personally they would consider such an act by a 
friend as hardly worthy of being called a " moral 
obliquity." Like many other deviations from what is 



390 



CAHABA. 



right, the act is considered by the masses as " sharp 
practice " when it succeeds, and only becomes a crime 
when it falls short of success. If the plan could be 
carried to a favorable termination it would earn for 
Hanchette a national fame. He would be the great- 
est hero of the war, and in thousands of homes the 
mention of his name would bring to eyes the tears of 
emotion and gratitude for his instrumentality in re- 
storing to wives and children and parents loved ones 
who for months had been mourned as though buried 
alive. He would justly be regarded as by far the 
most successful organizer and fortunate leader of such 
a plot known to the history of war, and, indeed, taking 
into account all the surroundings, his position would 
be unique in the annals of modern warfare. Having 
decided upon the course that should be pursued, he 
carefully selected as his assistants a few in whose fidel- 
ity, prudence, courage, and good sense he could rely. 
Those who had been for any length of time confined 
in military prisons of the South had observed that 
in every prison were confined some men who in 
every possible way courted the favor of their guards. 
These sycophants were sometimes rewarded by the 
prison officials for their fawning acts, and were always 
ready to debase themselves, trusting to the possible re- 
wards that might follow. 

They would even worm themselves into the confi- 
dences of their comrades that they might become pos- 



CONFIDANTS. 



391 



sessed of information wiiich, repeated to their costo- 
dians, would win for them a smile of approbation. 
In many cases a long acquaintance was necessary to 
discover their servility ; so, after selecting two or three 
comrades, Hanchette was obliged to depend upon 
their judgment in the choice of the few only to whom 
his purposes could be made known. One of his 
first confidants, after Spencer, was Sergeant Owens. 
This prisoner's record, which was easily learned from 
his companions and from the prison guards, at once 
prepossessed the captain in his favor, and only a few 
days elapsed after his entrance into Castle Morgan ere 
he formed the acquaintance of the sergeant. 

Cautiously broaching the subject in which he was 
so deeply interested, he found in Owens one fully in 
accord with his own ideas, and from him he received 
many practical suggestions, the result of his own ad- 
ventures, and his longer experience as a captive. 

Another young man in Castle Morgan, on whom 
nature had placed her decoration which marked him a 
nobleman, was Mart Becker, a private in some Wis- 
consin regiment. By his partner in Castle Morgan, 
George W. Culp, I am told that Becker was captured 
during an engagement, and at the time of his capture, 
perceiving that the colors of his regiment were likely 
to fall into the hands of the enemy, he tore the flag 
from its staff" and secreted it beneath his clothing. 
Embracing the first opportunity when darkness shield- 



392 CAHABA. 

ed him from the vision of his guards, he carefully 
wound the flag about his body, underneath his under- 
garments, and thus conveyed it to Cahaba. Here the 
same vigilant care to keep his possession a secret was 
exercised by Becker, and his devotion was rewarded by 
success. Months after, while crossing the Black River, 
in the rear of Vicksburg, he had the pleasure of un- 
furling it, and under its folds marching into the lines 
of his friends. Possessed of a powerful frame, a clear, 
intelligent blue eye, a face that beamed with manli- 
ness and courage, he quickly arrested the attention of 
Captain Hanchette, and a brief acquaintance strongly 
confirmed the opinion which the Illinois officer had 
instinctively formed. 

As early as was prudent after their brief acquaint- 
ance he suggested the possibility of a general prison 
delivery, and learned that Becker was willing to risk 
his life in any reasonable undertaking. In a later in- 
terview he laid before the Wisconsin comrade the 
project which he had proposed to Owens and others, 
and from that hour Becker became a trusted ally 
Through Becker's recommendation Gulp also was ad- 
mitted into the conspiracy. 




JACOB W. RUSH. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

JACOB W. RUSH A ROUGH JOKE IS THE MEANS OF HIS 

BEING AMONG THE CONSPIRATORS — SERGEANT DIL- 
LON, OF NINTH ILLINOIS CAVALRY D. M. MAXON, OF 

SECOND MICHIGAN CAVALRY HOW MEN FACED WHAT 

SEEMED ALMOST CERTAIN DEATH. 

ANOTHER of Hanchette's party owed his asso- 
ciation with the conspirators to a rough joke 
practiced upon him by a thoughtless friend. He had 
been picking the ever-present vermin from his only 
shirt, and when the hateful duty had been performed, 
Stood up and was drawing the garment over his head. 
At the time he was standing near the " dead line" on 
the inside of the prison. A spirit of boyish mischief 
impelled a friend who noticed him just as his head was 
hidden in the shirt to give him a push, and he fell 
sprawling over the " dead line." He knew the danger 
of his position in an instant, and tore the garment 
from his head. The guard, perhaps half in jest, sprang 
toward him and seemed determined to transfix him 
with his bayonet. The prisoner, a small, black-haired 
bright-eyed, boyish soldier, grasped the bayonet plung- 



394 CAHABA. 

ing toward him, and almost with the quickness of 
lightning turned it away from his own body, and push- 
ing it deeply into the earth, sprang like an athlete 
backward from the dangerous locality. It chanced 
that both Hanchette and Becker were standing- near 
by, and were witnesses of the boy's coolness and pluck. 
As he stood before them naked to the waist, they no- 
ticed further the scars made by a bullet that had passed 
completely through his body, and carelessly inquir- 
ing from one who seemed to be an old acquaintance, 
they learned that he had not been a " skulker" during 
the three years of his service. The friend who had 
known him long related to Hanchette how the boy 
had enlisted in the Third Ohio Cavalry early in 1 86 1 , but 
had been demanded by and returned to his parents 
on account of his extreme youth ; how a few months 
later, with their consent, he had again entered the same 
regiment, had participated in the pursuit of Zollicof- 
fer through Kentucky, the battle of Pittsburgh Land- 
ing, siege of Corinth, the battles of luka, Bardstown, 
Perryville, Stone River (near which he was wounded 
through the lung), and other engagements ; how at 
a later period he had been wounded in the knee, and 
later had served as a courier, during which service 
he had been captured, after a nine-mile chase, while 
bearing dispatches to General Rousseau. The name of 
the boy was Jacob W. Rush. The history given by 
his friend only impressed Hanchette more favorably 



SERGEANT DILLON. 



395 



and seeking his acquaintance, a short time later, both 
Becker and Hanchette urged him to join in the at- 
tempt to be made for freedom, and at once he accept- 
ed and entered into its spirit with all his energetic 
nature. Sergeant Dillon, of the Ninth Illinois Cavalry, 
also played an important part in the councils of the 
conspirators. For two years he had served in his regi- 
ment under the successful raider, Grierson, and later 
under the hard fighter, General Ed. Hatch. His 
military training had been such as familiarized him with 
danger and rendered him a valuable addition to the 
band that solicited his companionship. He had been 
captured only a few weeks previously, while recon- 
noitring the advancing forces of Hood, and shortly 
after he and his companions had dashed upon a weak- 
ly guarded portion of the Confederate column and 
captured the headquarters train of General Chal- 
mers. In committing these reminiscences to history I 
should convey an incorrect impression if they led the 
reader to believe that Hanchette recruited a major por- 
tion of the men who were to serve in the daring effort 
for liberty. Several of those who became his valuable 
assistants were as active and earnest and careful in se- 
lecting proper men for the dangerous work as was the 
one who first definitely proposed the plan. Through 
the influence of Owens, Collins, his trusted assistant in 
the tunnel scheme, consented to become an actor in 
the tragic play that took place a few nights later, and 



39^ CAHABA. 

through the persuasion of Becker, Spencer, and others, 
several of the most reliable men in the compact were 
added to the party. Nor should an impression be left 
that only the most daring in the prison were admitted 
to the plot. There was no man among all those in 
Castle Morgan who was willing to hazard more, to 
engage in work the most desperate and daring, if it 
but offered a reasonable prospect of success, than 
Grimes, the Virginian. Careful inquiry into the history 
of many would show that with us, in Castle Morgan, 
were men who would face any danger, involving 
even death itself, without fear or faltering. During the 
engagement at Wyatt, Miss., in 1863, the Ninth Illi- 
nois Infantry, in order to dislodge the enemy from a 
strong position, made a charge and were repulsed with 
heavy losses. Later, when darkness shut off all vision 
beyond a few rods, General Ed. Hatch determined 
to again assault the position. He ordered a detail of 
ten men and a sergeant from the Ninth Illinois Cav- 
alry ; these reported to him, by his order dismounted. 
To Sergeant Orton the general gave the command 
to lead his men over the same ground where a few 
hours before the Ninth Infantry had been beaten back 
by a withering storm of lead. The sergeant, startled 
by the surprising order, asked the general if he had 
understood aright, and was given the order a second 
time. " But, general, will any come back alive .?" 
asked the subaltern. " Perhaps not, sergeant. I wish 



BITS OF HIS TOR V. 



397 



to draw their fire to know their strength before mak 



&' 



ing another charge. It is better to sacrifice ten men 
than a thousand ;" and in face of what seemed almost 
certain death, the resolute sergeant and his men, who 
had heard all, ascended the little hill and drew upon 
themselves the fire of the enemy. Some of these men, 
too, were in Castle Morgan. When the Confederate 
General Hood decided to attack General George H. 
Thomas, at Nashville, in the fall of 1864, he added 
first to this command a portion of Dick Taylor's army. 
The army of Hood then numbered about fifty thou- 
sand men. The force of Thomas at Nashville num- 
bered thirty thousand, and he had an equal number 
elsewhere under his command, but too distant to be 
made immediately available. The great problem then 
with Thomas was how to delay the advancing forces 
of Hood until he could call in his distant troops and 
have forwarded to him Union troops from other mili- 
tary departments. Early in December a pontoon 
bridge was thrown across the Tennessee River at Flor- 
ence, over which the Confederate general was to 
march his troops. The hope of Thomas was in delay- 
ing his enemy. Volunteers were quietly called for 
from the ranks of the Second Michigan Cavalry to 
destroy the Confederate pontoons. The gravity of the 
situation was made known to them. If they can suc- 
ceed in destroying the bridge and delay the advance 
of the impetuous Hood, even for a day, the gratitude 



398 CAHABA. 

of a nation will be due them, and their fame shall de- 
scend to their children. If, however, the fortunes of 
war shall deliver them into the hands of their enemies, 
death upon the gallows as spies may be their fortune, 
or they may be entombed alive in one of the great 
Southern prisons with an unknown fate before them 
from which stout-hearted men might well shrink back. 
Their patriotism is appealed to, and this decides their 
course. Only six men could be used, but half of the 
regiment was ready to go. At midnight they bade 
their comrades adieu, and in two log canoes started on 
their perilous errand. An old citizen was impressed 
into the service as guide. The strong current of the 
river carried them swiftly beyond their own lines and 
into the lines of the Confederates. In the sharp 
breaks, the whirling eddies, and the projecting rocks 
of Mussel Shoals their unsteady canoes were nearly 
swamped, and several times all were thrown from 
them headlong into the cold water. At the point 
where the Confederates have built their bridge a long 
island is in the centre of the river. The pontoon 
stretches from the shore to the island, a trestle bridge 
extends from the other side of the island to the shore. 
Intentionally, or as the result of ignorance of the situa- 
tion, their guide leads them into the channel spanned 
by the trestle. An attempt to destroy the trestle is 
worse than useless, and gliding beneath the structure, 
guarded by sentinels above, lighted by bright camp- 



A SCENE OF EXCITEMENT. 399 

fires at either end, they steal silently through the 
armies of the enemy bivouacked upon both banks of 
the river. A few miles below they release their guide, 
and avoiding Confederate camps and scouts, reported 
the following night to their command. A second de- 
tail is called for, and, though more conscious of the 
suffering from wet clothing in a chill winter night, 
more conscious of the danger to be encountered from 
vigilant sentries and bright fires, nearly all the same 
men attempt the perilous duty. No citizen guide is 
needed this time. A day later they start again. As 
they approach the pontoon a straggling train of Con- 
federate army wagons is crossing the bridge. The 
two canoes, which up to this moment had been side by 
side, separate and dart toward the portion of the 
bridge where they reason the lines may be attached. 
A man stands in the bow of each boat with a sharp 
hatchet. They expect to cut the ropes and float the 
greater part down the river. A bright light glares 
from the banks at each end of the pontoon ; armed 
guards are standing by these camp-fires ; a single 
wagon has just passed over; every muscle is tense, and 
every nerve thrills with intense excitement. Swiftly 
glide the frail boats nearer. Every eye is strained to 
catch sight of the great ropes that hold the pontoon 
against the swift current. A single blow from the 
heavy hatchet completely severs one rope, but their 
boat is overturned and lost, and they save their lives 



400 CAHABA. 

only by clinging to the pontoon. They hope fortune 
may yet permit them to escape, but at daybreak they 
are discovered. The men in the other boat do not de- 
tect their rope until it has caught the man in the bow 
under the chin and hurled him into the water. One of 
his companions, Sergeant Maxon, strikes the receding 
line with his hatchet, but at such a disadvantage as to 
only partially sever it, and enough of it remains to pre- 
vent destruction to the pontoon. A moment later this 
boat is overturned and scrapes beneath the floating 
bridge. Chance carries its occupants close beside it, 
and clinging to its side they float through the camp of 
the enemy, the water of the cold river chilling them to 
their vitals. Two miles below they are cast upon an 
island and there they empty the boat of its water, wring 
their clothing, and hasten to escape from the presence 
of the enemy. The following day all are captured. 
To their captors they explain satisfactorily the cause 
of their beinsf awav from their own command, and 
when questioned as to the attempted destruction of 
the pontoon, deny all knowledge of it. Accident and 
stratagem save the lives of the three captured on the 
pontoon. All these fearless fellows are in Castle Mor- 
gan, though not numbered with the insurrectionists. 
But why single out more .? What was true of the cour- 
age and valor of the men whom we have named was 
true of scores of men confined in Castle Morgan, but 
it was not prudent to make confidants of more than a 



A DISCUSSION. 401 

small number. One might reasonably call in ques- 
tion the discretion or prudence of men concerning 
whose valor there could be no doubt, and a dozen 
who knew themselves to be the sole possessors of such 
momentous knowledge would consider themselves 
under a more solemn bond of secrecy than they would 
were they certain that the same knowledge was pos- 
sessed by hundreds. Owens, who was deeply interested 
in the tunnel scheme, urged the captain to defer any 
attempt to capture the guard without explaining his 
reason, for cautiousness was a marked trait in his 
character. Calling together his associates engaged in 
digging the tunnel with whom he had been longer ac- 
quainted, he unfolded the designs of Hanchette, and 
sought their opinion as to the best course to pursue. 
Collins, a leading spirit in Owens' squad, strongly 
urged that the tunnel should be completed, that as 
many men as possible should be passed through it, and 
assist in the capture of the guard outside, at the same 
time that Hanchette and his followers should over- 
power the inside guards. After a careful consideration 
of this proposition, the tunnel men agreed to acquaint 
Hanchette with their plan, and sought to have him 
acquiesce in the proposal made by Collins. As soon 
as possible after this decision, Hanchette was informed 
by Owens of the existence of the tunnel and the 
opinion of his squad in regard to the outbreak. The 

captain requested an interview with all the members of 
26 



402 CAM ABA. 

Owens' band, hoping to win them over to his project 
before the completion of their undertaking. The 
meeting of Hanchette and the associates of Owens 
took place the night of the 15th of January, a dark 
and stormy night, in the southwest corner of the pris- 
on, the captain sitting upon the ground. Sergeant 
Owens in front of him, and around these central fig- 
ures crowded the adherents of the two leaders. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

A CONFERENCE ORGANIZING THE CONSPIRATORS — 

DIFFICULTIES OF THE SCHEME THE ASSAULT MADE. 

AFTER carefully questioning the men with whom 
he was personally acquainted as to the trust- 
worthiness of the others in the audience, he spoke in a 
low tone and laid before them the course he would 
pursue. He proposed, when the revolt should be 
made, to have at least two men near each of the 
nine inside guards, who would at an appointed 
signal enter into conversation with them, oflfering 
articles for sale, or soliciting them to bring from 
the outside such articles as the guards frequently 
sold to their captives — tobacco, sweet potatoes, or 
peanuts. At another signal he would have the 
two men cast a blanket over the head of the 
unsuspecting guard, throw him to the ground, 
wrest from him his gun, and under threat of instant 
death should he dare to utter a word of alarm, 
march him to the water-closet, where all would 
be retained until the prison should be emptied of 
its inmates. To such guards as might reasonably 



404 C AH ABA. 

be expected to offer the stoutest resistance, three 
or even more men should be sent. The assault 
upon the single guards was to be timed to take 
place just as a new relief of nine men and a corporal 
should enter the prison. To secure this body, double 
their number of men were to be placed, apparently 
sleeping on the ground, near the door of entrance, 
and carefully numbered to correspond with the 
numbers of incoming guard, that each two should 
make no mistake in seizing their appointed victim. 
This bold stroke when successful would give to 
the insurgents nineteen guns and cartridge-boxes. 
Personating the guard relieved, a squad of men 
could pass outside the brick wall, through the cook- 
yard, and through the outer gate, before any sus- 
picion of the insurrection should be known to 
the relief outside. Following the pretended guard 
should be a score of resolute fellows ready to rush 
upon the unsuspecting Confederates, of whom a 
major portion might reasonably be expected to be 
wrapped in slumber. An outline of the plan to 
be pursued after this should be accomplished has 
been given earlier. Owens and his comrades listened 
patiently to the words of the captain, but deemed 
it best not to recede from the position they had 
taken. They begged him again to postpone his 
outbreak for a few days until the tunnel could be 
completed, and men passed through it to co-operate 



AN ANXIOUS WAITING. 405 

with him from without. Hanchette was impatient 
and would brook no delay. He declared that his 
men were fresh and strong and eager, and that post- 
ponement only increased the danger of detection. 
The convictions of each party, due in a great measure 
to their different experiences, were positive and 
unyielding. They separated without having come 
to any agreement, though Hanchette expressed the 
hope that the tunnel party would not fail to assist 
in the supreme moment, when their help would 
be sorely needed. Believing that the outbreak would 
occur before the tunnel could be completed, work 
on this was suspended until it was certain what should 
be the result of the captain's efforts. Hanchette 
hardly slept ; day and night he devoted to organ- 
izing a band of liberators, and though Owens and 
Collins and their party had given no assurance of 
aid, he spoke freely with them, and announced his 
determination to strike the blow on the night of 
the 17th. When the momentous evening came 
his numbers were yet too few, and reluctantly he 
postponed it to the following night. The night 
of the 1 8th found him but little stronger than 
before, and he was again compelled to defer the 
scheme that was consuming his very life. He had, 
however, on that day won over to his views Ser- 
geant Owens, and the two determined that another 
night should not pass without an attempt to carry 



406 CAHABA. 

their plan into effect. The close of January 19th 
ushered in a night dark and cold and most 
cheerless. A few during the day had been added 
to his squad, and at nightfall he designated mid- 
night as the hour for the attack. Midnight, one, 
two, and three o'clock passed with no assault upon 
the guards. Here and there moving among the 
shivering forms cuddled together upon the ground, 
a careful watcher might have observed Hanchette 
directing one, imploring another, explaining to a 
few the cause of delay. For three and four hours 
a few of his trusted men lay waiting patiently, as 
they had learned in the years of their hard service. 
Four o'clock approaches ; he dares not delay longer ; 
and begging some to go and awaken the comrades 
of their acquaintance and inform them of the struggle 
soon to be attempted, he directed his chosen men 
to be in readiness near the guards. Near the wide 
door or gate at the entrance of the inner prison 
was a bright fire that cast its rays out into the 
darkness over the prostrate forms of the captives. 
It was essential that a few should gather about 
this and obstruct the rays that entered the prison. 
Going to the spot where Collins was lying down, 
Sergeant Owens awakened him and whispered, " You 
must help ; the attack will be made in a short time; 
you must not lie still and let it fail for want of 
your help. You see the pitch-pine fire just inside 



COLLINS' STATEMENT. 407 

the big door which lights up most of the prison — 
that fire must be darkened so the guard cannot 
see the men who are to capture them. You must 
be one to take care of that; others will be there 
to assist you. Take along a blanket; shut off all 
the light that is possible. Be there at four." With 
this Owens went away to aid his chief in organizing 
his men. From a most interesting statement of 
his experience in Castle Morgan, written by comrade 
Collins, I quote the part performed by himself. 
" I walked through the prison and inspected the 
guards. At the main door there was a corporal and 
two guards. They did not seem over-vigilant. The 
fire was built some twenty feet inside the prison of 
pitch-pine fagots, and every time it would burn low 
the corporal would replenish it with a fresh supply of 
fagots. At times a few prisoners who had got too cold 
to lie longer in their nests would, by permission of 
the corporal, hover around the fire. This permission 
was- granted to only a few at a time. I made up 
my mind that the duty assigned to me would not 
be very difficult to perform, and resolved to do my 
part as best I could. So I went back to my bunk 
to await the appointed time, but before it came 
around the sergeant again called on me and urged 
me to be ready and make no delay. At about the 
right time, as near as I could guess, I stole the only 
blanket that covered six or eight men, and with it 



4o8 CAHABA. 

thrown over my shoulders, I approached his highness 
a corporal of the C. S. A., my teeth chattering, as 
he supposed from cold, but, as I knew, more from 
fright ; at any rate it served a good purpose at this 
time. I begged the privilege of warming by the 
fire. He nodded, as much as to say all right, and I 
at once accepted the permission thus given and 
got myself in position at the fire. Two or three 
others were sitting around the fire, but they soon 
crawled off to bed, and it was not long thereafter 
till I was joined by two more gentlemen with 
blankets over their shoulders. As they came up 
they gave me a knowing look, with the remark, ' It 
is awful cold,' and took their places by the fire. 
We had not long to wait until the guard at post 
number one cried out, ' Post number one, four 
o'clock, and all is well.' Number two followed in 
the same way. They both stood at the door, and 
then it went on around the prison to the last guard, 
when it died out in echoes far down the river. In 
less than five minutes we heard the relief guard 
coming. The doors of the main entrance consisted 
of two large ones that filled a space, I should think, 
ten or twelve feet wide. A small door was cut 
in one of these, about two by seven, for the guards to 
pass through at night. This small door was fastened 
by a bar on the outside, as was also the large ones. 
As soon as we heard the click of the bar we spread 



THE ATTACK. 4O9 

ourselves over the fire, not like angels of light, 
but rather like angels of darkness. This was fol- 
lowed around the prison by a stifled, smothered 
cry of ' Help, murder ! ' answered by an undertone, 
' Silence, or you die.' The door half opened, and 
as the corporal came in, he heard the cry around 
the prison and knew it meant trouble. Instantly 
he jumped back just as eight or ten determined 
men sprang like tigers from out the darkness at 
his throat ; but he was too quick for them. The 
door banged shut, the bar clicked as it fell in its 
place, and we were again walled securely within 
our 'living tomb.' The attack was made just one 
moment too soon. The work inside was admirably 
done. Every guard had been captured with nine 
stand of arms, and not one of our men hurt. The 
guards were hurried to the water-closet and were 
themselves put under guard there, and the attempt 
was made to organize and batter down the doors; 
but it was useless, as there was nothing out of which 
we could make a battering-ram. For this no prepa- 
ration had been made. It was unlooked-for, un- 
thought-of during all the time preparation had 
been going on. Outside the Rebels were beating 
the long roll and officers were calling loudly on their 
men to fall in. It was impossible to batter down 
oaken doors with naked fists, and the time already 
lost was fatal to our plans." Up to one o'clock of 



4IO CAHABA. 

the morning of the insurrection there were probably 
not two dozen men who were fully informed of the 
plan of Hanchette and his copartners. Another score 
of men had learned through these that an " indefinite 
something," intended to release the prisoners, was in 
an embryotic state. Until this time, had the injunc- 
tion of the leaders been faithfully regarded, the feat 
would have been known to those only who should be- 
come fully committed to its prosecution. One mem- 
ber of the band has stated that a solemn oath was 
required of him at the time of his admission to their 
companionship. Without questioning the statement, 
I must express the belief that this was not universal, 
nor even usual. In the majority of cases the only 
perquisite was a positive knowledge by some one 
that the intended new member was a person of un- 
questionable bravery, intelligence, and discretion, and 
that no person could be introduced without the con- 
sent of the leader, who determined to limit the mem- 
bership up to the night of the assault to the minimum 
number necessary to carry out his plan. Several of 
those who were participants in the capture of the 
guards were entirely unacquainted with the existence 
of any plot until only a few hours before it was car- 
ried into execution. Neither Hanchette nor his aides 
fully comprehended the hopelessness of further effort 
when they failed to secure the relief guard. So many 
hours and days of intense, absorbing thought and 



A GRAVE MISFORTUNE. 4II 

planning had been devoted to the purpose ; seem- 
ingly, so carefully had all the minutiae been considered, 
so fully had the leaders convinced themselves of ulti- 
mate success, so easily had the guards within the 
brick wall been overpowered, they seemed persuaded 
that only an interruption, and not a defeat, had been 
encountered. Their convictions and previous success 
had given their hopes a momentum not arrested by 
the grave misfortune that prevented their exit from 
the prison. A majority, however, who had thus far 
been active participants, as soon as they compre- 
hended the insurmountability of the obstruction, 
stood as if paralyzed, or withdrew from an enterprise 
only too evidently doomed to defeat. Not so with 
Hanchette, Dillon, and others. Seeing their forces 
melted away, they called again and again upon their 
fellow-prisoners, the most of whom until a few min- 
utes ago had been sleeping, to join with them in 
another effort to break out from the prison. Pre- 
vious to the incoming of the relief guard there had 
been little more of noise and confusion than ordi- 
narily obtained in that densely crowded prison, that 
human ant-hill. Even the cries uttered by the strug- 
gling sentries as they desperately strove to throw off 
their assailants caused but little more excitement 
among those captives not informed of the plot, and 
awakened but little suspicion in the minds of those 
guards about the prison who were not disturbed. If 



412 CAHABA. 

in the assault strange noises had been uttered, the 
occurrence was too common to arouse curiosity among 
the prisoners or anxiety in the mind of the sentinels. 
The senses of the men here crowded together have 
been obtunded by cold and benumbed by physical 
wants, and the sentry has long since ceased to wonder 
at occurrences most strange to him when a novice. 
About him are thousands of men — men packed more 
densely than cattle in pens. Strange noises have 
often been heard issuing from the lips of men de- 
lirious with disease, or coming from the throats of 
men struggling with thugs and assassins ; these guards 
have not been placed about the prison to prevent rob- 
bery, to protect the weak and defenceless — their only 
office is to see that no man escapes from that wretched 
place and the nightmare that is present through day 
and darkness. But a new cry awakens the captive, 
alarms the captor. Failing in the first attempt, their 
followers retiring from a hopeless cause, the leaders 
step back from the strong barred gate, and shout, 
" Fall in, men, fall in ! " What magic in the words ! 
Men dreaming of battle and the scenes in their soldier 
life, where the sharp words portend much, instinctively 
spring from their inhospitable beds. A confused mur- 
mur, growing louder, spreads over the prison, and in a 
few moments all are wakened. The guards outside 
this place of confinement and restraint listen to the 
ominous words, to the subdued tones momentarily 



INTENSE EXCITEMENT, 413 

increasing, and in alarm run from their posts of duty. 
Awakened by the cry, " Fall in, men, fall in ! " and the 
general confusion, I sat up. All over the prison men 
were rousing and asking of the nearest companion 
the reason of the subdued excitement. Strange and 
unexpected scenes were constantly thrust before us, 
but here was a violent departure from any precedent. 
Watching for a few moments, and listening to the 
words and shouts of those most active, it was soon 
apparent that an attempt at prison delivery had been 
made, and at the last moment had been defeated. We 
could hear the excited shouts of the Confederates 
without, and the " long roll " sounding the alarm added 
to the dread confusion. (Permit me to refute here, 
in a brief parenthesis, a malicious slander emanating 
from an irresponsible source. The statement has been 
made, in a public meeting, at a national encampment 
of the G. A. R., that a member of the Eighteenth 
Michigan, out on parole in the town of Cahaba, beat 
the " long roll " which aroused the sleeping guard. I 
have carefully sifted much testimony upon this point, 
and can say that the author of the statement is a colossal 
liar, and his words, unsupported by other testimony, are 
unworthy of consideration.) Up to this point the men 
who had been most noticeable by their vehement words 
of exhortation and command were the men who were 
the lieutenants of Hanchette, the men who were fully 
informed of, and the leaders in, the insurrection. Now 



414 CAHABA. 

to the increasing turmoil another class of men added 
their cries. Awakened from their sleep, wholly un- 
aware of the bold conspiracy that had originated in 
their midst, hearing the beating drums and the shouts 
of preparation without, recognizing as a leading spirit 
of the uprising Owens, the man who had so long worn 
the clanking chains, a man whose cautious manner 
and preoccupied mind had impressed many of his 
fellows with the idea that he was a fanatic, men as 
brave as Logan, as dashing as Custer, cried out to 
their fellows, " The leader is an insane man ; he is a 
brave, unreasoning fanatic. 'Tis crazy Owens. Don't 
try to follow that lunatic. Lie down. The Rebels are 
ready to kill every man that attempts to pass out." To 
these men, unconscious of the careful considerations 
which had been given to the project, this wild up- 
rising was one of the most crazy of senseless schemes. 
Captain Hanchette again called to his fellow-prisoners. 
Stepping to the centre of the prison, with a firm, 
commanding voice he exclaimed, " I want a hundred 
men, men of courage, to fall in immediately." Only a 
few responded to the captain's call. He then made 
a most impassioned and touching appeal, his voice 
tremulous, not with fear, but with intense emotion. 
" Comrades ! brave men ! we can make our escape. 
There is not a guard upon the stockade, and those 
inside have been overpowered ; will you not make 
your way out of this hell-hole } You who have never 



AN IMPASSIONED APPEAL. 415 

faltered in the charge, nor your faces blanched with 
fear when before cannon belching canister, will you 
not accept your liberty ? Fall in, form in two ranks 
right here ; I will lead you." To nearly every man 
not belonging to his band Captain Hanchette is an 
entire stranger. He has been an inmate of Castle 
Morgan but little more than two weeks, his face is 
unfamiliar. The brave lion heart that is beating in 
his breast, the soul that never knew fear, the calm 
daring, the most marked trait of the man, is less 
known than his face. For this reason his stirring 
words produced but little effect ; few only were in- 
fluenced by his words and offered to^him themselves. 
Had the form and face been that of William Rea, the 
wealthy, influential citizen, who a few months before 
had been our prison magistrate, the man of mature 
years, of sound judgment, of the most intense loyalty, 
known and respected by every Union soldier who had 
entered Castle Morgan previous to his exchange, the 
burning words would have been followed by an al- 
most unanimous uprising ; had the speaker been that 
loyal Kentuckian, Andrew J. Conn, the broad-chested, 
eagle-eyed young man who had been our former 
sheriff", he who had a few weeks before leaped from 
a flying train and escaped to freedom, a man known 
to nearly all the inmates, and known to have been 
one into whose composition fear had never entered, 
and from whom courage and good sense never de- 



41 6 C AH ABA. 

parted, had he been the speaker a different result 
would have followed. But this man addressing the 
turbulent crowd, prepossessing though he be, is a 
stranger. Sergeant Owens is regarded by the masses 
as the leader, and this staunch man as one of his en- 
thusiastic followers. A knowledge by those acquainted 
with the plot that their plans have been frustrated, the 
misunderstanding by the crowd of the man, his char- 
acter and position — both these things robbed his 
words of all force. Had a hundred men such as 
Hanchette himself sprung to do his bidding, immedi- 
ately after the failure to pass through the little prison 
door, by mutual aid they might have scaled the high 
brick wall where the roof had been blown away ; but 
now too much time has elapsed. The watchmen 
without had recovered from their fright, and we hear 
them being marshalled to repel their unarmed assail- 
ants. Again and again the cry is repeated, " Lie 
down ; 'tis one of crazy Owens's freaks." The efforts 
of the captain are annulled. He recognizes his help- 
lessness, his inability to influence the men he would 
lead from a worse than Egyptian bondage, and scald- 
ing tears of anguish coursed down the cheeks of the 
strong man in his agony. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

RIGNEY HIS CONNECTION WITH THE INSURRECTION 

AN ACCIDENT A CONFEDERATE'S BRAVERY THREE 

DAYS OF FASTING — SEARCHING FOR THE LEADERS. 

IN another part of the prison a ludicrous scene was 
occurring, a farce side by side with an awful tra- 
gedy. Among the persons we found confined at Ca- 
haba, on our arrival there six months before, was a 
dwarfed specimen of manhood, whose height was 
that of an ordinary boy of twelve years. On his 
shoulders, disproportionately broad and square, was 
placed, with almost no neck intervening, a head such 
as persons present who in childhood have been 
afflicted with " rickets." His face was wrinkled and 
prematurely old. He impressed one as an anachronism, 
a person born out of his time, a clown, the dwarf court 
jester of our English kings two centuries ago. His 
voice was shrill and harsh, and his accents told of 
Celtic parentage and associations. With many per- 
sons an acquaintance of years is necessary to fathom 
the depths of their nature, but observation of this 

queer boy-man for a few minutes teaches as much as 
27 



41 8 CAHABA. 

an acquaintance of a lifetime. His manner was blus- 
tering and bullying to a degree, that, in consideration 
of his limited physical power, brought an involuntary 
smile to the face of the onlooker, that would have 
been a frown had the boy's physique been commen- 
surate with his words. His associates were the thugs 
and " muggers" and gamblers of the prison, " Perry," 
Tom Hassett, Pat Ponsonby, and Kelly. By these he 
is made a pet and prot(^g6, and by these his vaporings are 
laughed at and cheered. His purse is never empty, he 
i^ always able to purchase sweet potatoes and peanuts 
and bread from the guard, and by the more thought- 
ful, puritanical soldiers is deemed too intimate with 
his captors to be worthy of confidence in any scheme 
to which only men of unquestionable loyalty should 
be admitted. The name of the boy is Rigney, a mem- 
ber of the Third Kentucky Cavalry. By chance he 
awakened just as the outbreak was begun. He knew 
nothing of the intentions of the conspirators up to 
that moment, but passing near the water-closet, where 
Mart Becker and Gulp had just overpowered a guard, 
and hearing one of them remark to the disarmed Confed- 
erate that he would not be hurt, he seized the Confed- 
erate's gun leaning against the brick wall, and lifting 
it to a " carry," strutted back and forth, a self-consti- 
tuted watchman over his recent guards. The unex- 
pected situation gave him an opportunity to assume 
an important role, and nature would assert itself. 



EIGNE V. 419 

True, to some one the duty would be assigned, but 
he would not ordinarily have been the first selection. 
Back and forth the little hunchback paced his beat, 
chaffing his prisoners, addressing them as his own cap- 
tives, as though he was the sole originator of the 
outbreak. To the Confederates he has always been 
one of the best known of the Union captives. They 
speak to him by name and discuss with him the prob- 
abilities of the insurrection. In a lofty and authorita- 
tive manner, he replies to their remarks, and dismisses 
subjects of the utmost importance with the air of one 
who held them in the hollow of his hand. To the 
men who have accomplished all that has been done 
his suddenly acquired power awakens at first a feeling 
of surprise, then of mirth. Meanwhile the Confederate 
officers have not been idle. Roused suddenly from 
their slumbers, they hastily dress and form their men 
in line. Cautiously approaching the prison, they ob- 
serve no evidence that any of those with whose safe- 
keeping they had been charged have so far passed out- 
side the place of confinement. Gaining confidence, 
they carefully ascend to the guard walk at the top of 
the stockade. Here they learn that the large and 
small doors are still closed. This fact inspires them 
with confidence and increases the boldness of the 
men they command. They double shot with canis- 
ter two pieces of artillery that have been used to 
" cover " the prison, and bring them into the prison 



420 CAHABA. 

yard. Placing these so they will sweep the wide door, 
if a rush through this is attempted by the insurgents, 
an officer carefully opens the little door and peers 
within. He hears the turbulence and noise, but sees 
no sign of formidable, organized resistance. A face- 
tious youth recognizes the gray coat and brass buttons 
of an officer, and in a jocular tone calls out, " Come in, 
Colonel, we won't hurt you." Instinctively the major 
knows that a majority of the men before him are 
aware that the insurrection cannot succeed. This fact 
gives him increased assurance ; by this time, too, the 
mouths of a dozen rifles are peeping through the door. 
Advancing a few feet out of the range of the guns of 
his men, he replies vehemently, " You won't hurt me ; 

no, but by , I will hurt you." With the sharp 

point of his sword he thrusts at a group of prisoners 
close by and wounds several. An acquaintance, now 
residing in Kansas, then a member of the Fourteenth 
Iowa, still favors a leg wounded at that time. Many 
who have been standing near the door, fearing that 
in the excitement a volley may be discharged into 
the prison, fall back from the main entrance. Turning 
to his command, he orders the large door thrown open, 
and the two cannon brought within. Ere the Con- 
federates had entered the prison-yard, all attempt to 
form a " forlorn hope," implored by Hanchette, had 
been abandoned. The entrance of the officer was 
the death-knell to the possibility of further effort, and 



COLONEL JONES. 42 I 

those who had been most prominent in the insur- 
surrection, to conceal from this time on their identity 
as fully as possible, retired into the dense crowd. Rig- 
ney, at the first sound of the officer's voice, dropped 
his gun as though it had suddenly become a hot iron 
in his hands, and ran headlong into the throng. His 
importance, acquired so unexpectedly, departed more 
quickly than it came. In a few moments, under com- 
mand of Colonel Jones, a force of armed men, fearfully 
excited, have formed a dense line across the end of the 
prison next the door. Their guns have been carefully 
loaded and every bayonet fixed. The two nine-pound 
Napoleon guns, double-shotted with canister, pushed 
their muzzles through the ranks. From ground in 
front of this line which has been used as a bed, until 
within an hour, by hundreds of men, every Union 
soldier is driven with horrid oaths and curses; sick and 
well, strong and weak, are literally jammed into the 
farther end of the prison, leaving a wide space be- 
tween captor and captive. The commander of the 
prison, with every sentence a blasphemous utterance, 
demands to know the fate of the captured sentinels. 
Some one cries out, " They are all right." The an- 
swer is unsatisfactory. '-Give up those men," is the 
order shouted by the ctDmmander. But none of the 
captured guards appear. "They can't give them 
back," yelled a Confederate guard, " they have killed 
them." " Give back the men instantly," is repeated. 



42 2 CAHABA. 

The men are still in the water-closet ; so much noise 
is made that the shout of the officer is not heard 
at the end of the prison where the guards are still 
hemmed in. The cowardly Confederate officer gives 
orders to push the cap into the cannon and take aim. 
" Ready," he shouts. The man at the lanyard steps 
outside the cannon's wheels — if he is in the track of the 
cannon when it is discharged, its recoil will give him 
serious injury — the lanyard is drawn " taut." The Con- 
federate captives are not brought forward ; there has 
not been time to get them and force them back 
through the densely packed crowd, even had any one 
attempted to do so ; in another moment the order to 
fire will be given. What an awful slaughter it will 
cause ! — cannon double-shotted at a distance of fifty 
feet — our men are jammed so closely together that it 
is hardly possible for some to breathe. The cowardly 
brute in command of the guards again shouts, " Give 
up those men in two minutes or I wnll blow you from 
hell to breakfast with nine-pound Napoleons." He 
turns to the men at the lanyards ; he will order " fire " 
before half of the time he unconsciously named has 
passed. He is a coward, he was tried and convicted of 
the basest cowardice shown during the siege of Vicks- 
burg. Cowards are nearly altvays cruel, and the same 
strange fate that sent Wirz to Andersonville, Barret 
to Florence, and Fitzpatrick to Meridian, sent this 
man to Cahaba. But the reckless bravery of another 



A CONFEDERATE'S BRAVERY. 423 

officer, a Lieutenant Crutcher, of a Missouri Con- 
federate regiment, saved him from committing 
the awful crime of murdering men by hundreds. 
Hardly had the sentence escaped from Colonel 
Jones' lips, and while he turns to the cannoniers, this 
brave Confederate officer leaps before the mouth of 
one of the pieces of artillery and shouts, " Don't fire, 
you will kill me if you do." The craven cashiered ty- 
rant turns toward the hero, and dares not give the 
order that will certainly destroy him. And the other, 
never moving from the muzzle of the cannon, shouts 
to the prisoners to bring out the men if they be alive. 
A Union man in the dense crowd tells him the 
guards are not hurt, that they are coming forward as 
fast as the throng will admit. The hero remains at 
his post, and one by one the captive guards come 
through the struggling mass of humanity, and when 
all are restored, with oaths and vindictive curses the 
Rebels pass out of the prison, leaving no guards with- 
in the inner wall. All this occurred hours before day- 
light. As soon as we were left alone, I returned to 
the place where I had been sleeping, and in a restless 
manner passed the remaining hours of the night. 
The first hazy light of the new day had hardly been 
diffused through the prison yard, when, like a pack of 
enraged hounds, the guards in strong force entered the 
prison with fixed bayonets. " Get up, you G — d d — d 
Yankee s — n of b — hs, get up or I'll jam a bayonet 



424 CAHABA. 

right through you. You white-livered Blue-BelHes, 
get out of this," was the salutation all over the prison. 
A man who had been sick near me the previous day 
did not obey the order. I shouted to the guard who 
was near him that he was too sick to move. " Oh , 
you d — d nigger-loving abolitionist, I'll see whether 
you can get up," and with a fierce lunge he drove the 
bayonet through the thigh of the prostrate form. 
For me to stay was to share the same fate. I hurried 
on to the southern part of the prison, where all were 
driven to be counted, and as soon as I was permitted 
to return I hastened to the invalid who had been un- 
able to rise ; he was cold and stiff. Death had taken 
place hours before, and no more would he be tortured 
by hunger, cold or wet, and even the pitiless thrust of 
the bayonet could not bring the frown of pain to 
please a brutal, cowardly tyrant. The counting was 
over, and none of the cursed abolition Yankees had 
escaped. In a short time an oflficer came into the 
prison and said the men who had been leaders in the. 
conspiracy must be delivered over for punishment. 
Whether he supposed his wish would be complied 
with I do not know, but he walked about the yard for 
some time, apparently in expectation that his victims 
would at once be delivered over to him, and seeing no 
movement in that direction, he swore a wretched oath 
that not a G — d d — d mouthful of anything could we 
have till those men were delivered up. Early that 



SCANT RATIONS. 



425 



day a detail of Confederates entered the prison seek- 
ing Rigney, and soon finding him, guarded him out- 
side the stockade. The fortunes of the little hunch- 
back for a few days were most pitiful. Our rations 
were drawn each day, and were always so scant that 
all was consumed within the time. Hours passed on. 
To those who were in as good health as I was, the 
gnawings of hunger came and would not be appeased. 
Some few who were ill and had not consumed their 
rations entirely, attempted to cook them, but even 
that privilege was denied them, and in desperation the 
uncooked meal was mixed with water and swallowed, 
or deglutition was accomplished after prolonged mas- 
tication reduced the coarse meal to a tasteless, pulpy 
mass. The long, chilly, sunless day was passed by us 
in suspense and speculation as to what would be done 
by our captors. The night followed and found men 
going often to the water-barrels, trying to cheat their 
unreasoning stomachs and persuade them into quie- 
tude. Growls and curses of the " damned Confeder- 
acy" were more numerous on the second day than the 
first. About noon an officer came into the prison 
and called out into the cook-yard all those who were 
in charge of companies. With them as the represen- 
tative of Company D, Second Battalion, I passed out 
into the cook-yard. All except the specified persons 
were ordered into the inner yard. To each one of us 
the question was asked, " Can you tell who the leaders 



426 CAHABA. 

were in the attempted delivery ?" The same answer 
came from all : *' I cannot." We were reasoned with 
— told that we and every other person in the prison 
should be kept there without food till we did furnish 
the desired information. It was of no use to reason 
with us. All declared ourselves as unconscious of the 
names of Ithe conspirators as we would have been had 
we been in " God's country" up to the moment the 
question was asked. When the officers had passed 
out, every man said, "They can starve, and starve and 
repeat, but they cannot find out who were the daring 
men that so nearly carried into execution the plan for 
our release." To one of the conspirators, whom I had 
recognized on the night of the insurrection, I went, 
when I could do so without exciting suspicion, and 
told him of the demand that had been made of us. 
He was anxious — who would not have been at such a 
time } — but was considerably reassured after learning 
that there was no one willing to sell him into " pun- 
ishment," whether that might mean "tying up by 
thumbs," iron anklets, hanging to the ladder, starva- 
tion or death, or, as it afterward proved, a repetition 
of the " Black Hole of Calcutta" on a small scale. 
Among the men inside the same question was asked 
by another Confederate, and a reward was promised 
to the man or men who should turn traitors to their 
companions in misfortune ; but with violent oaths, 
many a soldier swore that he would help to " skin and 



''GETTING EVEN." 427 

draw and quarter" any man or lot of men who dared 
to give the information ; and so the day passed on, 
adding nothing to the fund of information so anxious- 
ly sought by our captors. While the " Yankees" held 
the guards as captives, some who had been especially 
obnoxious were more or less roughly treated. I was 
afterward told, that previous to the raid upon the 
guards it had been fully agreed that no unnecessary 
rough treatment should be extended to them, and es- 
pecially was bloodshed to be avoided until the last 
moment. Some, however, of the men who had been 
subjected to the abuse of particular guards could not 
resist the splendid opportunity offered for " getting 
even" with the tyrants. One fellow was held by two 
" Yankees" while another blackened his face thor- 
oughly with lamp-black abundantly furnished by the 
pitch-pine fire, and then to make his toilet complete, 
his face was rubbed with a little piece of bacon rind. 
When he came on guard the next day he was about 
the complexion of a dark-skinned mulatto, and many 
a sally was made about the " Rebs" putting on negro 
guards. The fellow winced at being called nigger, 
but could not help himself, and as soon as possible 
nearly rubbed the skin from his face in his anxiety to 
escape the taunts of his captives. Another young 
braggart who at the time of the raid had begged for 
his life, and piteously implored the " Yankees" not 
to kill him, as he claimed to be an unwilling soldier 



428 CAHABA. 

to the Confederacy, determined to compensate for his 
cowardice and fear by abundant assertions of his 
prowess. " Yes, sah, it took a heap of them ar Blue- 
Bellies to o'power me. You bet your life my bayonet 
left a pow'ful hole in one of their dogoned carcasses." 
He was heard to repeat the tale of his prowess by 
some of our men several times, and rather sneered at 
others of his comrades who had made a less heroic 
resistance. The leaders in the affair could not be dis- 
covered ; bribes were offered to any one who would 
betray them ; threats were made of a punishment 
worse than starvation if we did not betray them. So 
far, each method was equally fruitless ; then some Con- 
federates suggested that one of the conspirators could 
be found any way, for one of them had had a taste of 
Southern steel he would not forget and that he could 
not hide for a while* The idea was an inspiration. 
" Yes, we've got you all now," and at once an order 
cam.e in for us to be thoroughly examined. The pro- 
gramme was short. " Sergeant, have all these Yanks 
put into the south end of the prison, in the inner 
yard. Make every one of them undress and tie their 
clothes up in a bundle ; have them take that bundle in 
both hands, hold it over their heads, and pass between 
two lines of the guard ; each Yank must turn his body 
around once while passing between the inspectors, 
and walk through to the outer yard." That was 
the order, and though it was January, and not a very 



NO NFL USSED. 429 

hot day either, every man was stripped as directed, 
and a most thorough inspection was made ; but, alas, 
the only discovery made was the romancing of the 
guard, and the glamour with which he had surrounded 
himself changed into a shirt of Nemesis. His com- 
panions whom he had by inference upbraided ridi- 
culed his prowess. His captors called him "the bay- 
onet hero." Two days had now gone by, and no food 
had passed the lips of any man in the prison. Men 
who had belts girted themselves tighter, and all went 
often to the water-barrels. Men feel hunger less if 
they can drink much. 

The third day dawned and brought a new scheme. 
They would bring in their guards and see if they 
could not identify some of their captors. All the 
prisoners are drawn up in line. Each one of the men 
who had been captured on the eventful night passes 
along the line and inspects each of its individuals, but 
we are all black with smoke and grime — all were 
ragged ; all were haggard and sour from our involun- 
tary fast — certainly all had many points in common. 
Can the detectives choose aright? A company is 
passed, and no culprit is named. From another com- 
pany a man is asked to step aside ; two more are taken 
from another band ; here and there other men are sin- 
gled out, and then we are disbanded ; the cross-exam- 
ination frees some, but not all. A man from my com- 
pany, a member of the Second Michigan Cavalry, 



430 CAHABA. 

named Blakely, is declared by one of the guards as 
one whom he recognizes. The man slept on a piece 
of ground near me. When I awoke that night so full 
of incidents, I chanced to look in the direction where 
Blakely was sleeping. The bright blaze at the gate 
threw a light about him, and at my first glance he 
was apparently sleeping ; then came the shouts and 
noise following the capture of the guards, and at once 
he raised to a sitting posture. I heard him ask what 
the excitement was about, and when he fully compre- 
hended its extent he remained sitting. He was cer- 
tainly not with the band of liberators at the moment 
of their attack on the gate ; it was unreasonable to 
suppose he had been with them before ; he would 
have remained with them till that moment at least, for 
there had been nothing to cause him to withdraw 
from them. I go to the officers who propose to take 
him out of prison ; I assure them of all the facts as 
observed by me ; will not my statement release the 
accused ? The guard says it is only a lie to save the 
d — d Yank. He is led out of the prison, while the 
search for those most prominent in the uprising still 
continues. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

ARREST OF MART BECKER — HANCHETTE BETRAYED HIS 

HEROIC DEMEANOR REFUSES TO BECOME AN IN- 
FORMER TO SAVE HIS OWN LIFE HIS DEATH AT 

THE HANDS OF COLONEL JONES. 

MART BECKER is being hunted for. He is 
conscious that he cannot escape being taken 
out of the prison. He has little hope of escaping 
recognition. The long hours that have elapsed since 
the revolt — hours that have brought him no food — 
hours so full of anxiety that sleep has closed his eyelids 
but little, have broken his spirit. At home is an in- 
firm mother, loving and loved by her manly son. He 
is her staiT and support. As thoughts of her come 
to him great tears well up into his eyes, and a sob 
of deepest emotion bursts from his lips. Said he to a 
dear friend, when he knew that in a few moments he 
would be in custody of the guards, " For my own 
self, I care nothing for my life, I would willingly 
have given it for the freedom of these men, but for 
the sake of one at home I would gladly have lived 
longer." Noble fellow, he only asked to live for one 



432 CAHABA. 

who had cared for him in his weakness, or to die for 
those who had with him " touched elbows " in his 
strength. The searchers approach and take him in 
custody, and though his eyes be red in love for those 
at home, he passes out the noblest of God's creatures, 
a manly man. There were many such in that drear 
place. Captain Hanchette as yet has not been ap- 
prehended ; he is aware that the searchers have a clue 
to him, but his friends hope he may escape. Spencer 
changes clothing with him twice when those who are 
seeking him have entered the prison. He has grown 
weak and haggard. The attempt to release the pris- 
oners is called by Colonel Jones, the commander of 
the prison, a mutiny, and he vows its punishment 
shall be death. For Hanchette, the days previous to 
the outbreak have been days of ceaseless bodily and 
mental activity, since that time they have been filled 
with the most intense anxiety and foreboding. Like 
Becker, his thoughts are always of home. There are 
those whose happiness is dearer to him than life (in 
an Illinois town he has a wife and babes), dearer than 
everything else on earth, except honor. The officers 
are taking out two little New Jersey men. They cer- 
tainly had no part in the release. I have noticed them 
for several weeks previous ; they look like the boot- 
blacks and ragpickers along the East River, or like the 
stowaways on an ocean passenger ship. What can it 
mean, taking out these two ragamuffins, these Jersey 



TREACHERY. 433 

bounty -jumpers ? We had not thought of treachery ; 
our hearts were absorbed in the possible fate of the 
men who might be destined to punishment. Soon 
an officer returns and takes out more men, among 
them Hanchette. The ragpickers have turned in- 
formers. From scraps of information, the prison 
officials are assured that not only is the captain one 
of the leaders, but was the chief of the leaders. They 
have gathered, too, enough of his past history to know 
that he was in Castle Morgan acting the role of a 
citizen, when his true status was concealed. They 
state to him the facts they have learned, and declare 
to him that his life is surely forfeited. They assure 
him that whatever may be the penalty dealt to others, 
his penalty shall be the greatest. He has no reason 
to question their intentions. After making to him 
these assurances, they resort to another scheme. 
Through spies introduced into the prison and through 
the two traitors, they have ferreted out much of the 
plot. They fear there may be more (the unknown, if 
suspected, is always feared more than the known). 
They reason that this man knows more of the designs 
of the Union prisoners than any other one they have 
placed in custody. They are willing to bribe him to 
divulge his knowledge. They offer a mitigation of 
punishment ; they tempt him with liberty if he will 
designate fully all those who were his associates, and 

the plans for the future, if there be any. Their offers 
28 



434 CANADA. 

are offensive 'to his manhood. They bring before 
him single individuals believed to have been his 
assistants ; they guarantee him reward and protection 
if he will but give them assurance that the suspected 
persons were concerned in the plot. Again and 
again he refuses to implicate any one. When several 
had been brought into his presence, and the question 
asked if these had been guilty of mutiny with him, 
he responded, " 'Tis a waste of time, and to you an 
irritation, to bring these soldiers before me. I will 
not recognize any one as an associate with me in the 
attempt to release the prisoners. Do with me what 
you will ; death on the gallows is better than life pur- 
chased with the blood of the noble fellows who have 
risked so much. I will betray no one." His ring- 
ing words are borne back to us in prison, and send 
the blood tingling through men whose hearts have 
been chilled by thoughts of the fate that awaits 
him. Life on the terms offered with it would be 
unendurable to him, any death that may be inflicted 
upon him but ennobles him in our eyes. His words 
are a prophecy. Three months later he is shot down 
— shot like a wild beast — shot by men behind him, as 
he staggers weak and faint from the prison cell ; but 
his reticence has saved most of the men who were 
with him. In all seven men are retained charged 
with the crime of mutiny, and assured that speedy 
death shall overtake them. One after another of the 



BRAVE RIGNEY. 



435 



suspected persons are returned to the prison, and we 
are glad to see Becker with us once more. One of 
the men who has been outside brings to us the report 
that even Rigney was made of better stuff than we 
supposed. He tells us that the Confederates, hoping to 
wring from the little hunchback by fear some knowl- 
edge of the conspiracy (Rigney was the first person 
arrested), bound him to the mouth of a cannon and 
threatened with death by its discharge if he did not 
reveal the names of the conspirators. " Fire away," 
cried the boy, " but if you kill me General Washburn 
will shoot a dozen in retaliation." The action of the 
Confederates was certainly only a stratagem to scare 
from the boy any information which he could give ; but, 
though he could give no information of the plot, he 
had certainly seen some of the men who had captured 
and conducted the guards to the water-closet. Then the 
little fellow was confined in a box, and for several days 
subjected to indignities that should not be given pub- 
lic mention. When all had been examined and six 
retained, Rigney was placed in confinement with the 
others. That the attempted outbreak should bring 
consternation to the citizens and military of Cahaba is 
not to be wondered at. Had the Union prisoners suc- 
ceeded in their purpose, hundreds of horses, mules, and 
conveyances would have been seized and carried away ; 
hundreds of cattle would have been killed for food ; 
thousands of dollars' worth of property would have 



436 CAHABA. 

been wrested from its owners; every house on or near 
their course to Pensacola would have been plundered 
for food and clothing, and the torch would have been 
often used in a spirit of pure mischief or in real or 
fancied revenge. That rage followed consternation 
was natural, but the treatment meted out to the un- 
happy seven captives was more in accord with the 
spirit of the sixteenth century than that of the nine- 
teenth. One of the seven men retained was " Michi- 
gan " Blakely, the man who belonged to the company 
of which I was commissary. " Michigan " was a 
sturdy, rough-looking man of thirty or thirty-five 
when I saw him that day ; and when, six weeks 
after, an old man of seventy was brought into prison 
and assigned to my company — an old man who went 
about with his hand placed against his forehead to 
shade his eyes, an old man stooped with age, his hair 
a dirty gray, his skin, as it showed through a ragged 
shirt, covered with blotches and scars — I thought of any 
one else except "Michigan" — but he it was; his hair, 
not gray from age, but from nits, his skin bitten by 
lice. It is sickening to write about it, it is sickening to 
remember it, it was pitiful and maddening to look at 
it. From him we learned where his comrades were. 
Three days without food. The supposed leaders had 
been taken away. The demands of discipline have 
been complied with, and at last we are called to get 
one day's rations. No time is lost by those who act 



''MICHIGAN'' BLAKELY. 437 

as commissaries ; no time is lost by those wlio cook ; 
the quickest manner of cooking is resorted to ; and 
I for one eat all I receive as soon as it can be cooked. 
Had it been three days' rations it would have been 
the same. But to go back to the men taken away. 
" Michigan " stated that as soon as they were taken 
out of the prison all were carefully searched for any 
concealed weapons of offence or defence, but, of 
course, there was nothing of any consequence found. 
Then they were marched to the town calaboose. In- 
side this, in the centre of the building, was a dungeon 
about six feet square. It was just large enough to 
allow four men to lie down at one time while the 
other three sat quiet. In the same room was a slop- 
pail intended to receive the faeces and urine of the occu- 
pants, and a pail for drinking water. In the dungeon 
there was no window. In the door was a small open- 
ing ten or twelve inches square ; this is safely guarded 
by a little iron lattice door. Twice each day the little 
iron door opened and through it entered their meal of 
corn "pone" and water. No form of meat is allowed 
them. Out of it goes their faeces and urine. The 
room is too dark to see each other plainly, too dark 
to pick off from their clothing the pestful lice ; the air 
is horrible, loaded with faecal odors, damp with the 
moisture of their breaths, sickening from being so often 
respired, for only another little opening, looking out 
into the darkness and carefully guarded, permits a slug- 



438 CAHABA. 

gish change of atmosphere. The Hce upon their bodies 
increase with enormous rapidity, their hair is covered 
with nits, their scanty clothing is another breeding 
ground, the dark blue of those who have any remnant 
of their uniform looks like a mixture of pepper and 
salt. Little wonder that " Michigan " and his compan- 
ions came back to us weak and decrepit ; little wonder 
that they brought to us a sad story of failing health in 
their companions. Cattle confined in low, dark cel- 
lars become tuberculous ; or, confined where exercise 
is impossible, even if supplied with light and air, their 
muscles undergo fatty degeneration. Animals of any 
species compelled for a long time to respire an im- 
pure, poison-laden atmosphere, with it saturate every 
tissue, and every organ is under its influence. In the 
Mammoth Cave, far from the surface of the earth, 
where no ray of the sun has ever penetrated, fish are 
found without eyes ; disuse of these organs through 
many generations has been followed by their com- 
plete atrophy. The law that produces atrophy in the 
lower order is not broken in the higher. When 
" Michigan " came back from the dark dungeon his 
eyes, from weeks of almost disuse, were weakened to 
such an extent that even the light of the cloudy days 
was painful to them, and for many days it was only 
possible for him to grope his way about the prison with 
his hand to his forehead. With him were released 
two other men ; four were retained — Hanchette, Ser- 



AN ACCOUNT OF HANCHETTE' S DEATH. 439 

geant Owens, Rigney, and one whose name I cannot 
recall. When the last lot of prisoners were removed 
from Cahaba, in the spring of 1865, Owens and Rig- 
ney and the third man were taken from their cells and 
forwarded to Vicksburg with them. Hanchette was 
refused an exchange or parole. On the arrival of 
Owens and his companions at Vicksburg the com- 
manding general of that place was informed of the 
condition of Hanchette and the fact of his retention. 
At once a demand was made of the Confederate 
authorities for his release. By comrade Rush, of 
Larned, Kan., a wealthy, intelligent, and respected 
gentleman, twice a Senator in the State of Kansas, I 
have been given the following account of the fate of 
Captain Hanchette. The facts were detailed to him 
by the Confederate general through whom, in his 
official capacity, the exchange of Hanchette was de- 
manded. The minutiae of the case were detailed to 
comrade Rush by the general while passing a pleasant 
evening together at the Wilder House, in Louisville, 
Ky., shortly after the close of the war. In exchange 
for Captain Hanchette a Confederate general con- 
fined at Vicksburg was offered, if the captain were 
delivered immediately, without trouble or delay. The 
Union commander was willing to give a general for a 
captain in order to hasten with all possible speed the 
release of the man in the dungeon. The proposition 
was accepted by the Confederate officer, and he wrote 



440 CAHABA. 

to have the captain forwarded without delay. When 
the order for the release of Captain Hanchette w^as 
received at Cahaba the commander of the prison, 
Colonel Jones, who both hated and feared his victim, 
selected two villainous men to act as his guard, and 
gave them instructions to find some excuse for shoot- 
ing him while going from Cahaba to Selma. Captain 
Hanchette was taken forth from the dark dungeon, 
his strong frame so reduced that he was scarcely able, 
even under the stimulus of hope, to stand, placed in 
the custody of the assassins, and started toward 
Selma. He was shot down in cold blood before he 
was a mile from town, a fate perfectly in accord with 
a confinement rarely paralleled in the bounds of any 
civilized country in the nineteenth century. The his- 
tory of the Sixteenth Illinois Cavalry, in speaking 
of Captain Hanchette, incorrectly states that at the 
time of the insurrection he and his men succeeded in 
breaking out of the prison, and for two or three days 
resisted capture, but, finally overpowered, they were 
carried back to Cahaba, where Captain Hanchette was 
shot to prevent his falling into the hands of the Union 
general Wilson. I wish to state that in writing the 
narrative of the captain's connection with the insur- 
rection, and his fate, the utmost care has been taken 
to verify every fact and carefully exclude all question, 
able statements. It may be asked, " What of the two 
wretches to whose treachery, in part, a portion of this 



TWO DEPRAVED WRETCHES. 44 1 

Story of misery should be ascribed ?" The miserable 
creatures (we will not defile the word " man " by ap- 
plying it to them) were pa'roled and allowed to go 
about a small portion of the town ; they were given 
fairly decent clothing, and, for a time, better food than 
we received. Although they would have been hor- 
ribly punished — probably killed outright — had they 
ever again entered the prison, they were seen a few 
times sneaking about the outside of the stockade by 
some of our men, but the epithets of hatred, loathing, 
and scorn that assailed their ears made the proximity 
of the prison an undesirable place of resort. When 
we were removed from Cahaba, in the spring, two 
self-condemned, self-banished forms were seen far up 
the street, slinking, hiding from the view of the men 
by whom they were abhorred ; and let us hope enough 
remained of the God-given self-respect that must once 
have been theirs to make them heed the burning, 
bitter execrations hurled at them by the departing 
soldiers. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

AFTER THE INSURRECTION JONES BREWER THE 

FLOOD INCIDENTS LAUGHABLE, SAD, BARBAROUS. 

MEN were often called out of the prison to chop 
wood, and in several cases one or more of a 
party would attempt to escape ; during the winter, 
on one occasion, a party was taken on a boat down 
the river ten or fifteen miles for wood. Among the 
number were J. W. Jones and George Brewer of the 
Eighteenth Michigan and a boy belonging to some 
Illinois regiment. After working all day they were 
placed in a small barn or shanty, and a guard sta- 
tioned at the door outside. When all others had fallen 
asleep the trio arose quietly from their resting-places, 
lifted a board in the floor, and digging under a sill 
were soon away from the locality. 

All started for the Alabama River, and Brewer and 
the Illinoisan succeeded in swimming it, but Jones 
was so poor a swimmer that he nearly drowned, and 
was only too glad to return to the bank he had just 
left. Soon after daylight a pack of dogs were placed 
on the trail of the fugitives. Jones was soon found ; 



STEREOTYPED QUESTIONS. 443 

the Other boys were traced to the river, a boat was 
procured, and a few miles over the river Brewer and 
his comrade were found up a tree, where they had 
climbed to escape from the dogs. In passing sen- 
tence upon the refugees, Jones was placed upon short 
rations (imagine what short rations meant to men 
who for months had been compelled to depend upon 
the adipose stored up previous to capture), while 
Brewer and his friend wore shackles for several weeks. 
Few men entered Castle Morgan after our return 
from Meridian ; but as soon as the cry of " Fresh 
Fish " was heard (a cry meaning that new prisoners 
were arriving), downhearted, homesick men would 
gather about the gate watching for a familiar face, and 
if none were found, they would stand about the new- 
comers and ask the old stereotyped questions : "What 
do you know about the war ?" and " What do you hear 
about exchange T " Don't you think we will be ex- 
changed soon T And the hard-muscled, brown-faced 
boys, who a month before had never given a thought 
to the possibility of their being captured, could only 
give a vague rumor regarding exchange, but would 
tell how Hood had been annihilated at Nashville, 
and " Billy" Sherman had picnicked through Georgia. 
Then some thin-faced scarecrow, who used to be a sol- 
dier of Thomas or Sherman, would throw his old rag 
of a hat in the air and shout, "Three cheers for 'Old 
Pop' Thomas," or "Bully for 'Old Billy,'" and for a 



444 CAHABA. 

few hours the gloom that had surrounded them Hke a 
pall would be driven away. 

Only men who have been thoroughly and desper- 
ately homesick, entirely discouraged, always hungry, 
at night always cold, can have a clear conception of 
our mental condition during the long, dreary months 
that for us marked the fall, winter, and spring of 1864 
and 1865. 

After the insurrection, increased vigilance on the 
part of the guards was imperative, and to a prison 
already the most secure in the Confederacy new 
strength was added. 

Little change from the routine of previous months 
occurred during the remainder of January, nor until 
very near the latter portion of February. Then, as if 
the commander of the prison, Jones, had cast about 
for other means of making our place of confinement 
more intolerable, and by virtue of a previous con- 
tract with the Prince of Evil had secured the aid of a 
malignant demon, a demon having power over storms 
and floods, for days we were shut out from the 
light and warmth of the sun and were surrounded by 
the clouds and fogs and rains of Labrador. 

The long-continued rain raised the waters of the 
Alabama until its banks were full ; the snow on the 
hills and small mountains at the source of the river 
was melted by the spring sun, and added its own 
volume to the seething mass of waters that came rush- 



WET QUARTERS. 445 

ing down upon us. In the early afternoon of the 
first day of March, the water of the river, distant at all 
times only a few feet, entered the prison and covered 
the lower portion of the ground. After that it quick- 
ly covered the whole surface of the prison, the por- 
tion where I was sleeping being overflowed before or- 
dinary bed-time, and by midnight there was no dry 
spot to be found at any point. 

All night the men stood up in the cold water, a 
few being able to climb upon the roosts; but the 
roosts were built only to bear the weight of a small 
number, and those who were their occupants strenu- 
ously objected to their being sought as a refuge from 
the involuntary chilling foot and knee-bath that was 
thrust upon us. 

Nor was it safe for a large number to crowd upon 
a roost. In one case a large number crowded upon 
one of the roosts, and their weight crushed it to the 
earth, or, rather, water. A man who was in one of 
the lower tiers was caught by the falling timbers 
and his back nearly broken. 

Men shivering with cold, with teeth chattering as 
in an ague, preferred to wade about in the chilling 
water rather than chance climbing upon a rickety 
roost and have it fall and crush them for their pains ; 
they preferred the evils they already had rather than 
fly to those they knew not of. 

As soon as the following morning (Monday, March 



446 CAHABA. 

2d, 1865) came, with several sergeants I went into the 
outer yard to see some one of the officers of the guard, 
hoping that we might be allowed the privilege of an 
ir^terview with the commander of the prison, Colonel 
Jones. 

We had been there but a short time when a boat 
rowed up to the stairs leading to the walk about the 
top of the stockade ; in the boat, as good luck would 
have it, was the very person we sought — Colonel 
Jones. As soon as he had mounted to the walk, I 
saluted him, and asked that we might be marched out 
to some dry ground several feet higher than the 
prison, a short distance away. He replied that it 
would give us too good an opportunity to get away. 
The possibility of an escape at that time was an absurd- 
ity. The whole country was flooded. The whole prison 
was without shoes to their feet or covering to their 
backs. If they had been turned loose with permission 
to walk unmolested to their own armies, there were 
not twenty men in the whole three thousand who 
possessed enough endurance to have accomplished 
the feat. The majority of them had been broken down 
so thoroughly with cold, and hunger, and wet, in 
sleeping on muddy ground, and enduring the diarrhoea 
and dysentery chargeable to months of feeding upon 
coarse corn-meal, that they hardly had power to drag 
themselves about, much less escape through a country 
they knew nothing of, only that it was half-covered 



'A HEARTLESS FELLOW.\ 447 

with an icy water that chilled soul as well as 
body. 

VVe urged upon him that human endurance had its 
limit, and that in our case that limit had been nearly 
reached : that our food was only corn-meal, which we 
must cook before it could be eaten ; that we could 
not build fires upon the surface of a river; that our 
men were chilled already to the very marrow. He 
listened, we thought, with some attention ; our mis- 
fortunes, we hoped, had appealed to a tender part in his 
soul, and when we had ceased to speak, we flattered our- 
selves that our appeal would be followed by an order 
from him for us to be marched out to the dry ground, 
where there was an abundance of underbrush for fuel. 
We were mistaken ; he had listened, it is true, with in- 
terest to the tale of sorrow doubly told to him — told to 
him by his own eyes, told to him by our pleading 
tongues — he had listened not only with interest, but 
with pleasure, for he surely delighted in our miserable 
condition ; while he hesitated to answer, as a final ar- 
gument that we would not escape, I said to him : " I 
guarantee that every man in this stockade will not 
only not attempt to get away, but you can surround 
us with a double chain of guards, and, in addition, we 
will give our parole of honor, punishable by death if 
broken, that we will not attempt to escape." 

He replied then — I can feel the hate through this 
score of years. My blood boiled then with resent- 



448 CAHABA. 

ment ; it brings a flush to the cheek even now — " Not 
so long as there is a G — d d — d Yankee's head above 
water can you come out of that stockade." He turn- 
ed slowly and descended the stairs. 

It would be difficult for me to believe such a story 
as I have narrated, were it told me by any one, 
had I not been for three-quarters of a year a pris- 
oner in rebel prisons. I could not help saying to 
the narrator, " There must have been some mistake, 
some misunderstanding, that would in part excuse the 
crime, some misconception that would in part account 
for and lessen the heinousness of the deed." But I 
aver here, and every person living in Cahaba at that 
time knows, that the prison was flooded with the over- 
flow of the river, and that we were not removed from 
it at the time ; and if they are alive to-day, there are 
two hundred witnesses to our conversation, who will 
verify every word I have written. Alas ! of the two 
hundred who were about me, many are now, and were 
soon after, buried from the hospitals of Vicksburg, 
Jefferson Barracks, and the other locations to which 
they were sent as soon as they entered the lines of the 
Union army. 

At about the same time that I was captured, of 
fifteen men, acquaintances, who became captives, three 
alone saw the end of the war. 

There was nothing now for us but " to stand and 
take it" — any one can do that when they can do no 



MISERABLE SURROUNDINGS. 449 

better. Our ration on Monday was, as usual, meal, 
and, I expect, a taste of bacon. We had no wood in 
the prison, and, if we had, the art of building a fire on 
the surface of a lake had not then been perfected ; our 
meal, therefore, was eaten raw, and washed down by 
the thirst-slaking- water so bountifully supplied to us ; 
a little more cursing of the Confederacy than usual 
was heard throughout the stockade ; men who were 
willing to speak with moderation a few days before of 
those who would go into the army of the enemy, were 
not as temperate in their views at this time, and 
had a Confederate recruiting sergeant come among us 
then seeking names for his muster-roll, with a good 
deal more than the usual sharpness he would have 
been requested to go to the place " where their worm 
dieth not, and the fire is not quenched," and would 
have been informed that all his friends would ulti- 
mately " settle down" there with him. 

It was strange how every added injury and cruelty 
and hardship made men more devotedly attached to 
our Government and more devoted haters of the Con- 
federacy. 

Either Monday evening or Tuesday morning a ra- 
tion of crackers was sent into the prison. 

All night long men could be heard paddling and 
wading about in the chilly water ; occasionally a mis- 
step would be made, a hole would be stepped into, and 

the " sousing" would be announced with a yell. 
29 



450 CAHABA. 

In all the wretchedness and misery by which we 
were surrounded laughable episodes occurred, of which 
the following example is one of many : 

Extending from one side of the prison to the other, 
resting upon the tops of the side brick walls, were 
large square timbers used to support the roof and to 
prevent the spreading of the walls. Upon their upper 
sides they presented a smooth, flat surface broad 
enough for a man to lie extended upon with ease. 
To one of these timbers a tall, broad-chested Tennes- 
seean climbed ; for a day and two nights he had 
waded about in the cold water, not daring to climb 
upon a roost ; weary from his long period of wakeful- 
ness, he extended himself at full length upon the broad 
timber and in a few moments was fast asleep. For an 
hour or two he was motionless, then comfort required 
a change in his position ; half-asleep, not remember- 
ing his novel location, he threw himself impatiently 
upon his side, and shot downward into the watery 
bed below. A cry of astonishment burst from his lips 
as he smote the water, and a look of terror came to 
the faces of a few comrades whom he narrowly missed 
in his fall, as they looked up in surprise and fear lest a 
whole platoon might rush upon them from an un- 
known place above. Scrambling to his feet he spat 
the dirt}^ water from his mouth and was heard to re- 
mark morosely that he would " not go to sleep in that 
place again." Into the inner prison a Confederate 



AN UNHEEDED WARNING. 45 1 

officer rode mounted upon his horse. He was curi- 
ous to see the men in all parts of the prison, and us- 
ing his spurs freely urged his timid animal to the 
south side of the enclosure. Directly before him, con- 
cealed by the impure waters, were the sunken water- 
barrels from which heretofore we had obtained that 
fluid. Some one shouted to him that he would get 
wet if he rode about the enclosure. The warning was 
interpreted as a threat, and in petulance he pricked his 
horse sharply with his spurs. A moment later horse 
and rider were down, floundering in the deep water- 
course. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

STILL IN THE WATER DRINKING FLUID POLLUTION 

EATING RAW MEAL NEARLY ALL SICK IS IT A 

PAROLE ? LEAVING THE WORST PRISON OF THE 

CONFEDERACY. 

TUESDAY brought us no cheer. How long can 
human beings endure this ? We eat our scanty- 
food, and, feehng that prayers and curses are equally 
unavailing, look on almost disinterested spectators. 
One young fellow who had left college to enter the 
army as a private three years before, and had, in his 
studies, been much impressed by the doctrines shortly- 
after enunciated by Dr. Darwin, suggested to me that 
the law of atavism (transmission of ancestral peculiar- 
ities) was our only hope. Said he : " We have all as- 
cended from the lower order of beings, and the man 
who has inherited most from an amphibious ancestor 
has the best show in the skirmish." 

In the middle of the afternoon (Tuesday) some one 
came into the stockade and called out to us that we 
could go outside and get wood — all we wanted — that 
plenty of it was piled up near the prison gate. For a 



EATING RAW MEAL. 453 

moment we could hardly understand what good 
" plenty of wood" could do us ; then some one, the 
messenger doubtless, suggested that we could build up 
little " cob-houses," until they should be above the 
water, upon which we could place a platform of wood. 

The idea was seized in a moment, and all rushed to 
the gate and were permitted to go out at once ; big 
armfuls were laid upon the water and floated in ; in a 
short time the inner prison was covered with little 
wood platforms, and the night found us " high and 
dry." 

By this time a new and most sickening feature was 
added to our cup of sorrow, full already it seemed to 
overflowing. The food of raw meal and little pieces 
of raw meat produced their legitimate result, a uni- 
versal diarrhoea and dysentery ; it must be remember- 
ed that the stockade was built of logs standing closely 
side by side, and while they permitted the water to 
leak in between the cracks, once in it became almost 
stationary so long as the water was equally high with- 
out the stockade. 

This condition held true to a greater extent in the 
inner prison than in the outer — indeed, as the walls 
were brick on all sides, there were but two places 
where water could have an entrance and exit, by the 
gate, perhaps twenty feet wide, and through the close- 
ly placed boards that formed the wall of the privy; 
water, therefore, that once was in the brick enclosure 



454 



CAHABA. 



remained practically stationary, and anything floating 
on its surface never passed out. 

Remember that within an enclosure 190 feet long 
and III feet wide — 21,000 surface feet — were crowded 
over 3000 men, giving to each man a space only 2\ 
feet wide by 2f feet long. 

Before Wednesday, every man of my acquaintance 
was suffering from diarrhoea, having from two to a 
dozen movements in a day, all of which, floated upon 
the surface of the water or diffused through its sub- 
stance, was retained in the prison ; this water, more 
nearly related to the contents of a city's sewer than 
the pearly drops that fall from heaven to slake the 
thirst of fevered lips, was mixed with our meal for 
bread, was used to cool the aching brow, and, when 
some poor fellow whined out, " Please give me a 
drink of water," was dipped from its filthy pool to 
moisten a pasty mouth. 

Don't think this a falsehood ; to readers of to-day it 
seems impossible, but it not only was not impossible 
but was a sickening reality. 

When the water had become, on the first day or 
two, nearly knee-deep over the greater portion of the 
prison, it ceased to rise more and remained for several 
days stationary ; but until it had fallen so that men 
went to the water-closet, and faeces there deposited 
could pass out, the condition of the water became daily 
more and more filthy. 



SCURVY. 



455 



This ordeal was the one through which the hitherto 
robust physique of the writer could not pass unscathed. 
All through the weeks and months of the summer 
and fall the author had retained a voracious appetite 
and seemingly undiminished powers of endurance ; 
indeed, the unsatisfied hunger was a great torment, 
filling the days with restlessness and the nights with 
tantalizing dreams of food ; but that was better than 
the condition of system that made food loathsome, and 
when the flood entered the prison, I was, though 
poor in flesh and suffering slightly from scurvy, in fair 
health. 

The raw meal was like a dose of strong cathartic. 
Had we known that in a day there would be issued to 
us crackers, common-sense would have said, " Wait, 
even if you are consumed with hunger." But we did 
not know, and nothing in the past had led us to sup- 
pose we would be tenderly cared for. The man who 
had said, " Not a Yankee can come out of that prison 
so long as their heads are above water," would not be 
expected to render us any deeds of kindness, nor per- 
mit them if in his power to prevent. 

The severe diarrhoea and dysentery soon reduced 
me to apathy, weakness, and fever. A few days later 
the threatening scurvy was more pronounced, and ulti- 
mately ruined the excellent apparatus for mastication 
which nature had provided, and which, till captivity 
came, had been almost perfect. 



456 CAHABA. 

As the days passed on, the men suffering from 
bowel affections showed plainly their depressing effects. 

At first they only swore a little more than usual 
about the " d — d corn-meal" as they went often to the 
water-closet ; then we noticed in a day or two that 
they were less prompt in claiming their usual rations 
of the article ; their faces looked more sunken, their 
eyes more hollow, their steps more languid ; but we 
heard of none who were taken outside to the hospital ; 
they sat about during the whole day listless, spiritless. 
When they confined themselves to only a small 
amount of crackers or pounded it fine and browned it 
in our iron kettles, the disease was moderated, but 
never absent. Many resorted to this simple remedy, 
as it was the only medicine that we knew of be- 
ing used, and the days dragged on as before, except 
that daily a much larger number were dragging them- 
selves listlessly about with hollow eyes and parching 
throats. 

On the morning of the 2d, Confederate officers came 
into the prison in a small boat and paddled about 
in it to make their daily inspection. Our rations were 
issued to us from boats, a space being left between 
the little cob-house piles of wood for the boats to pass 
from one portion of the prison to another. A com- 
rade has written of this time in the following words: 
" We could almost flatter ourselves that we were 
inhabitants of the city of Venice. When we looked 



A SAD PEN-PICTURE. 



457 



at the piles of cord-wood on which we were perched 
we could easily imagine them to be the ' Bridge of 
Sighs ;' and we only had to close our eyes, then we 
were sure we were in some dungeon undergoing the 
worst tortures of the Inquisition, and that the rebel 
skiffs with their guards were the swift-gliding gondolas 
moving along in search of their victims. Yes, we had 
become Venetians, and our music rang out over the 
still waters, not in the gentle tones of the guitar, ac- 
companied by the sweet cadences of gay revellers, but 
in the hoarse and broken voices of three thousand 
suffering, shivering, starving creatures, with curses on 
their lips and bitterness in their hearts, consigning 
Colonel Jones and the whole Confederacy to the in- 
fernal regions of the damned. 

" On a pile of cord-wood not more than four feet by 
six could be seen from four to six persons living by 
day and sleeping by night, with no other exercise but 
that afforded by lying down and getting up, compelled 
to occupy these roosts no matter how badly the cord- 
wood bed bruised the flesh. The conditions of the 
prison had been bad enough before — in fact, we had 
imagined that under no circumstances could they be 
worse, but when the flood came we felt that, as com- 
pared with our present condition, we had been living 
in paradise before. We were as so many shipwrecked 
mariners floating about on the pathless ocean, with 
only a limited supply of cord-wood for life-preservers, 



458 ■ CAHABA. 

completely at the mercy of the waves. How we. 
wished that we could once more be landed on terra 
Jirma, and have the dirt and sand for a bed, or even a 
piece of dry ground to stand on. The water continued 
at about the same stage until the fifth day, when it 
began to fall ; but it was not until the seventh that it 
all ran out, and we could descend into mud and mire. 
All over the prison a sediment had been deposited 
some three or four inches deep, and the ground had 
become so completely water-soaked that it was not 
until about the tenth that it had become sufficiently 
drained to enable us to clean off the sediment and 
get down to dry ground. Every man who was able 
went to work and helped to clean up both inside the 
prison and the stockade, and by the evening of the 
tenth everything was clean and in nice condition, 
and the last vestige of the flood had been removed. 
This ended the great flood of Castle Morgan, which 
had continued from the morning of the ist of March 
until the normal conditions had been restored on the 
loth. A happier set of men, considering their sur- 
roundings, were never seen than the inmates of Castle 
Morgan when they got back to their regular quarters." 
(Ira F. Collins.) 

At this time active preparations were being made 
by the Union general, James H. Wilson, to make a 
raid upon Selma ; a knowledge of his probable inten- 
tion was possessed by the Confederates, and they were 



PAROLED. 



459 



extremely anxious to dispose of the prisoners con- 
fined at Selma and Cahaba. The operations of the 
Union troops east of Alabama promised less of secu- 
rity there than where they already were. If moved 
westward toward the Mississippi their recapture was 
equally probable. Their only hope of preventing our 
recapture was to parole us in a body and send us to 
Vicksburg. Of their desperate condition, however, 
we were almost wholly ignorant. 

Before the water had left the prison a few hundred 
men were called out and removed from Cahaba on a 
river steamer, and shortly — perhaps a day or two — 
after the water had receded from the place, the 
major portion of those remaining were informed that 
we would be paroled and sent to our own lines. No 
one believed the assertion. We placed no reliance on 
any statement made to us by our captors. If we 
should be removed, we believed it would be only to 
some other prison. At length we were marched out 
of the hated place and drawn up in line before the 
office of the prison commander. 

Colonel Jones then addressed us substantially in 
these words : 

" Men, you are about to be sent through to your 
lines, where I believe we will be able to make 
arrangements with the Commissioner of Exchange 
representing the Government at Washington for 
your exchange; but before we can move you close 



460 CAHABA. 

to your lines, and to protect the Confederate Govern- 
ment in case you are not exchanged, you will now 
be required to take an oath not to take up arms 
against the Confederate States of America until 
you are lawfully exchanged, and that until you are 
turned over by the Confederate officers to the proper 
officers of your Government you will not attempt 
to escape from the officers and guards having you 
in charge. Are you willing to take this parole ?" 
Every man in the line shouted " I am," whereupon 
a Confederate officer mounted a box and called for 
hands up, when he delivered the parole. When it 
was concluded, he informed us that the oath would 
be attached at the head of the roll of prisoners 
present that day, and would be retained by the officers 
in command of the guards that would accompany 
us. This performance over, the command " Right face" 
was given, and we were marched down to the landing 
and put on board an old steamboat, which soon after 
pushed out and started up stream, to the great delight 
of all the prisoners on board. 

Concerning our departure from Cahaba and the 
position which Castle Morgan must occupy in any 
truthful history of Confederate prisons, we quote 
again from Senator Collins: 

" About a mile above Cahaba, where the river 
makes a bend to the east, we caught the last sight 
of the grim walls of Castle Morgan, and in a few 



LEAVING CASTLE MORGAN. 46 1 

moments it was shut out from view by the river 
bank, and as it disappeared a prayer of thankfulness 
went up fiom every loyal heart on board of that 
rickety old steamboat, and all expressed the fervent 
hope that we might never see its accursed walls 
again ; that our feet might never again be compelled 
to press the ground on the spot where for the last ten 
months there had been greater misery and suffering 
than at any other on the whole face of the earth. This 
statement may be doubted, and even denied by some, 
but zvheii the facts are known Cahaba must go dozvn 
in histoiy as woi^se in a great many respects than 
Andersonville or any other military prison of the 
Confederacy. In the first place, it was five times 
more crowded than Andersonville. There was no 
greater supply of rations, and they were of no better 
quality, with no provisions made for cooking except 
a scanty supply of green gum and pitch-pine, while at 
Andersonville the meal was baked into bread outside 
the prison, and thus cooked was issued to the prisoners ; 
but at Cahaba nine-tenths of all the meal issued to the 
prisoners was either made into mush or eaten raw, 
on account of the scarcity of fuel to cook with. Just 
after, the attempted outbreak we were compelled 
to fast nearly three whole days without drawing 
a single ration. Andersonville prisoners never suf- 
fered this, and during the flood our treatment was 
the crowning infamy of all. It is true the misery 



462 CAHABA. 

and suffering at Andersonville was awful beyond 
description, and the tales of woe as related by its 
surviving inmates seem almost incredible, yet Cahaba 
was even worse, if human suffering from infamous 
and inhuman treatment could be worse." 

Writing this chapter in the history of the great 
Civil War, with the most scrupulous care to state 
only facts, we are conscious that its statements may 
be criticised and even denied by some as being 
unreasonable and an allegation of sufferings that 
would be beyond the limit of human endurance ; 
with such a possibility in view, we are glad to add 
to our own the testimony of another eye-witness of 
unimpeachable character. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

LEAVE YOUR BLANKETS AT SELMA FIVE DOLLARS 

FOR AN EGG — JACKSON, MISS. CROSSING BLACK 

RIVER — UNDER THE STARS AND STRIPES FARE- 
WELL TO COMRADES. 

IT is not probable that one-tenth of our number 
really believed we were to be sent to our 
lines, nor would they have believed it had every 
Confederate officer with us made a solemn affidavit 
to that effect. So many times, when moving from 
one place of confinement to another, was the same 
statement made and falsified, that we had learned to 
expect such a rumor and to distrust its truth. 

Every man on going out was ordered to leave all 
blankets and quilts not marked with the " U. S." I 
heard no explanation of this rule. 

This was a sad loss to those men who, shivering 
with sickness, needed a covering when stretched upon 
a cold, damp ground. It was more than ten days before 
they entered Union lines, and many of these days 
were cold and rainy and passed by the returning 
captives outside of all shelter. 



464 CAHABA. 

The phrase " on parole" seemed rather pleasant to 
our ears; it bore with it a feeling of liberty that was 
comforting. True, no one believed that it meant 
anything, but what pauper does not feel himself more 
of a man with the gold of another even for a short 
time in his keeping ? The delusion that it is his own, 
even though he knows that it is a delusion, is com- 
forting. 

We went on board the boat, and late in the after- 
noon arrived at Selma. The day was cloudy, and 
shortly after we arrived the rain began to fall. 

Somewhere we gathered up chips and sticks of 
wood and built a small fire, and as darkness drew on 
a few of us who had been comrades scraped the mud 
from the surface of the ground and lay down with our 
feet to the fire and like spoons in a bunch. The back 
of a friend a " blanket" in front, the breast of a friend 
a " blanket" behind, we passed the night, chilly and 
damp and feverish. 

The morning before leaving Cahaba I made a thin 
gruel from a tablespoonful of meal and a pint of 
water. It tasted well, but half of the amount was an 
abundance. The morning of the 14th we marched 
over to the depot, and while there I made my last 
sale of personal property to a peddler of cold-boiled 
eggs and biscuits. 

When I was captured I had a good silk handker- 
chief which I often wore about my neck. I had less 



COSTLY ARTICLES OF FOOD. 465 

fear of its beingf taken from me when thus worn than 
when carried unoccupied in a pocket. This handker- 
chief had been my " towel" all these long months^ 
often was my haversack in which to receive rations, 
had done duty in binding up the sore foot and ankle 
of a friend, and was ready at all times to perform any 
miscellaneous service to which it might be called. 

I loathed the thought of corn meal or anything 
that could be made from it ; the sight of the eggs 
awakened the thought that they might be palatable. 
I inquired the price of the eggs. " Five dollars 
apiece, or fifty dollars a dozen." I had become used 
to their estimate of Confederate money, and was not 
surprised at the answer. 

" How much are your biscuits worth ?" 

" Two dollars and a half each." 

Now, here was an opportunity to transact quite a 
heavy business. 

Then in a coy manner I brought forth my stock-in- 
trade, the handkerchief. 

I held it by its poorest corner, and flaunted its best 
part to the breeze. I endeavored to show but little 
anxiety to dispose of it, but knew that silk handker- 
chiefs were not the most common articles in the 
Confederacy, and ingeniously tried to direct his 
thought into the same channel. 

My efforts were a partial success, for he soon 
offered me for it the munificent sum of ten dollars.; 
30 



466 CAHABA. 

now, ten dollars, as usually understood, for a veteran 
handkerchief should make one's head swim, but I 
assumed an indifferent air, taking enough interest in 
its sale, however, to place my figures at fifteen dollars. 
Some one has said that " all things are possible to the 
man who waits," and I waited for him to come to terms ; 
after considerable sparring he raised his price to 
twelve dollars, and 1 came down to thirteen, and we 
closed the transaction at two cold hard-boiled eggs 
and one fair-sized cold biscuit, said to be composed 
of wheat flour and a little meal, but found to be com- 
posed chiefly of corn meal, with a small part of its con- 
tents flour. 

I ate one of the eggs, hoping it would be delicious, 
and it did taste different from anything I had eaten 
for nearly a year, but when it was finished I wouldn't 
have eaten the other for a suit of clothes, bad as I 
needed them. The appetite of an invalid is capri- 
cious. 

In the forenoon we got away for Demopolis, and 
after a six hours' ride found ourselves at that town, 
distant from Selma about forty miles. Six miles and 
a half an hour was pretty good time over that road. ' 

On the road the rumor spread among us that we 
were destined for some point in Texas. 

An indifference and despair had settled over us. 
We felt that we couldn't do much worse than we had 
been doing for the past two weeks, but we hoped 



SICK AND INDIFFERENT. 467 

that if they tried to take us over the Mississippi in 
small boats, some providential gun-boat would come 
along just at the right time and recapture us. 

Many of us could not hope for much more than 
that. For one, I was suffering from a continual fever, 
a constant headache, the bowel affection continued 
unabated, and having been in the same condition 
many days, and eating scarcely anything for a fortnight, 
I could scarcely travel. Any assistance that might 
come to us must not expect us to meet it half 
way. 

When we arrived at Demopolis we were put in an 
old shed. I cared nothing for any supper, so laid 
down on the ground and in due time was joined by 
my other companions, who "spooned" through the 
night, as usual. 

I neglected to mention that during the last day or 
two that I was in Cahaba some one died who had 
quite a good woollen shirt. This I boiled and washed, 
and wore from that time until we were given clothing 
by the Government at Vicksburg. 

The morning of the 15th we left Demopolis on a 
steamer going to McDowell's Landing, distant down 
the river perhaps ten miles. There we left the boat 
and boarded a freight train for Meridian, and some 
time in the night arrived there. 

I was too sick to notice much that was about me 
after leaving Demopolis, and from that time until we 



468 CAHABA. 

arrived in Vicksburg have but a dreamy remembrance 
of events. 

As an evidence of the wretched state into which 
the railroads of the Confederacy had degenerated in a 
year, it may be mentioned that while we occupied 
from early morning till late in the afternoon in going 
from Meridian to Selma, a distance of less than one 
hundred and fifty miles, in July, 1864, the same dis- 
tance in March, 1865, occupied more than twenty- 
four hours of constant running. 

Our party arrived in Meridian very late at night, 
perhaps past midnight, and I think we left some time 
next day. Arrived at Jackson by rail in another day 
or two, the train moving so slowly at times that men 
could get off from the train and walk as fast as it 
moved. One of the reasons that hastened the collapse 
of the Confederacy was the wretched condition into 
which its railroads had fallen. The road-bed was so 
uneven at places and the ground so boggy that in 
many locations the speed of the train was not more 
than two miles an hour, and a greater speed would 
have sent the cars toppling from the rails. 

We stopped at Jackson several days, our party 
being camped on a piece of ground west of the city. 

In the forenoon of the 21st rations were dealt out 
to us alleged to be sufficient for two days, and we 
were directed to be ready to move forward by one 

p. M. 



MOVING WESTWARD. 469 

An unnatural depraved appetite for a time took 
possession of me, and I set about to cook what had 
been dealt out. 

The rations for two days were a small piece of 
bacon the size of a man's thumb and a half pint of a 
mixture of flour and meal, with no salt or any other 
form of food. I mixed up the meal with water only, 
in a pint fruit can in the possession of one of our 
party, and borrowing a half of a canteen from another, 
greased the canteen with the bacon, and fried two 
pancakes. The bacon was just enough to comfortably 
grease the " frying pan" twice, and when it had done 
its duty thus far, there was nothing left of it to eat. 

The two days' rations, represented by two pancakes, 
were eaten at once, and at the appointed hour we fell 
into line, and all started westward. 

In our party were a large number of men who had 
served with General Grant in the rear of Vicksburg 
in the summer of 1863. Many had been in Jackson 
after the fall of Vicksburg, and when we started out 
from Jackson and took the most direct route to 
Vicksburg, they recognized the course at once, and 
conveyed to us the joyful tidings that we certainly 
must be on the eve of an exchange. The guards had 
told us so all the time, but men who had been told 
the same thing many times before placed no reliance 
on their words. 

Late in the afternoon a gentle rain began to fall, 



470 



CAHABA. 



and continued at intervals during the night and the 
following day. During the night we built fires from 
the underbrush, and in some manner obtained a 
broken, unsatisfactory sleep. 

Early the following morning we were on the road ; 
many of the men, like myself, had eaten their whole 
amount of food drawn at Jackson at one meal, so 
there was no time lost in cooking breakfast. During 
the day we passed over the battle-ground of Cham- 
pion's Hills, and late in the afternoon came to the 
valley of the Black River. This valley was com- 
pletely overflown with water, varying in depth from a 
few inches to a foot. For a distance of two or three 
miles we waded through this water, and just as the 
sun was setting behind the hills we came in sight of 
the river across which was the beautiful — yes, dear old 
flag, the Stars and Stripes, a line of nice white tents, 
and good, clean, strong, soldierly-looking men. 

My heart came up into my throat, and tears of 
deepest emotion gathered in my eyes. I could have 
cried heartily at the sight if I had only been alone, 
but surrounded as we were by our comrades, each 
man checked back the tears and pressed on to the 
bank of the river, which, from a little higher than the 
ground over which he had just travelled, was above 
water and comparatively dry. 

With clothing so scant, with the rain during the 
day, and with the final wading through the long 



UNDER THE STARS AND STRIPES. 



47t 



Stretch of cold water, I was more feverish than com- 
mon, and seated myself on a piece of driftwood, watch- 
ing with a sick man's interest the efforts of others in 
their attempts to procure a fire. 

At last it is accomplished — a big bright fire burns 
a hole into the darkness, and standing before it, I 
roasted one side and chilled the other until nearly 
three in the morning, when, having dried my clothes — 
my shirt and pants — I begged the privilege of a man I 
had never before seen — a man from some other prison, 
of crawling under his blanket, and after a time was 
lost in sleep. 

In a few hours the sun rose, and as it became 
warmer sleep was less broken, and I dreaming of 
being back once more in Castle Morgan — a troubled, 
anxious sleep, when a friend came to me and awoke 
me with the statement that my name had been called 
three times with no response. 

I hastened immediately to the point designated by 
my friend, and there found one of our own Union 
men calling the names of those who were to be 
received on parole, and as each man answered to his 
name, he started over a long pontoon bridge that 
extended across the river at this point. 

At the near end was a Confederate, at the farther 
end was a Union soldier. So persistently had we 
been deceived by the Confederate guards whenever 
we were moved from one prison to another, that I 



472 



CAHABA, 



doubt if there was a man in all our hundreds who felt 
certain of his liberty until he was past the last Con- 
federate and close to a rifle borne by a Northern 
soldier. With sluggish steps and aching, dizzy brain, 
I passed the last Confederate, the last emblem of a 
captivity which surrounding horrors and soul-sicken- 
ing scenes had caused to seem an age, and approached 
a lieutenant, who looked with pity and commiseration 
upon our rags and squalor and weakness. 

Upon the western side of Black River was a small 
hill. As I passed the Federal officer an ex-captive 
said to him, " If that hill were solid gold and you 
could give it to me to return to the horrors of a 
month ago, with all its uncertainties, even for a week, 
I would not consider it for a moment." He only 
expressed the feeling of every man I knew. 

A most dramatic occurrence took place during that 
morning, to a full understanding of which it will be 
necessary to go back to the previous year. The color- 
bearer of a Wisconsin regiment — the Twelfth or Thir- 
teenth — was Mart Becker. 

In an engagement of the fall of 1864 Mart Becker 
was captured with others of his regiment, and to save 
his colors he tore them from their staff and wrapped 
them about his body. All through the long months 
of captivity he carefully secreted them about his 
person or in his humble bed. When the attack was 
made upon the guards at Cahaba in January, 1865, 



MART BECKER AND HIS FLAG. 473 

Becker, who was one of the liberators, was wounded 
in the hand, and escaped detection because the guards 
were ordered to carefully inspect the bodies of the 
prisoners, and no attention was paid to hands. While 
being examined, along with all others, the flag was 
rolled tightly up and hidden in a boot, and as long as 
possible watched over by his comrade, George Gulp, of 
the Fourteenth Iowa. Gulp was one of the last to be 
examined for the reputed bayonet wound, and one of 
the first persons to return to his bed after the exami- 
nation was Becker. 

The flag wes carefully secreted, and the knowledge 
of its being in the possession of a prisoner was con- 
fided to but a very select few. 

The brave Wisconsin boy who had guarded his flag 
with so much devotion waited with impatience for his 
name to be called, that he might pass over the bridge 
that connected the Union and Gonfederate lines. He 
had prepared an impromptu substitute for a staff", and 
when a little more than half wav across the bridg^e he 
drew the flag forth from beneath his ragged garments 
and fastened it to the staff". Oh, what shouts went up 
from the prisoners as they saw it ! Strong men 
shouted and men too weak and sick to care for any 
common occurrence cried with emotion. Pandemo- 
nium was there for many minutes. 

Becker, I learn, lived to go to Golorado, and died, it 
is believed, in Leadville. 



474 CAHABA. 

It was past mid-day before all names had been 
called and the formal transfer of the prisoners had 
been accomplished. Then all were placed upon cars 
that had been sent out from Vicksburg, and in an 
hour we were at the " Four-Mile Bridge," east of 
Vicksburg, where it was designed for us to go into a 
temporary camp. 

By some misunderstanding, preparations for the 
comfort of the prisoners were entirely inadequate for 
the large number of which our body consisted. There, 
however, was no lack of food for those who were able 
to eat it. To a large number of us, however, the 
question of food was of minor importance ; to men 
burning with fever at one moment and chilling the 
next, whose mouths were bitter and pasty, whose 
bodies were emaciated by long months of scanty diet 
and long weeks of disease, the most palatable food 
might be loathsome. 

Many, like myself, had eaten nothing since leaving 
Jackson, two days before, and only cared to barely 
taste what might be obtained at the quarters of the 
commissary. What should have been prepared for 
the reception of our multitude were long lines of 
comfortable hospital tents, dozens of good nurses, and 
a body of cooks who knew how to prepare such food 
as sick men could eat. But, as mentioned before, only 
the most meagre provision was made. We were told 
that no one knew of our expected arrival until a very 



A TEMPORARY CAMP. 475 

short time before we came, and no intimation was 
given that our numbers would exceed a few dozen. 

We arrived at " Four-Mile Bridge," four miles east 
of Vicksburg, in the mid-afternoon. Obtaining from 
the commissary what could be obtained, I and a few 
other sick companions made a gruel of some crackers 
and beef, and then began looking for accommodations 
for sleeping. To obtain a tent or boards to make a 
shelter was entirely out of the question, and when 
night came on we were still without a comfortable 
place to sleep. 

As darkness began to approach we collected as 
much wood as our feeble condition would allow, and 
lay down upon the ground near a fire, roasting one 
side of the body and freezing the other. As many of 
our number was suffering severely from diarrhoea, 
some one was up at all hours of the night, and our 
fire was replenished as often as necessary. 

Near the place where we camped was a cane-brake 
swamp, thickly studded with tall, stout canes. On the 
following day, borrowing a hatchet from the tent of 
an officer, our " mess" cut a great many of the canes, 
and from them we built a little shed-like shelter, large 
enough for our number to sleep under, where we 
would be sheltered from any breeze and the dampness 
deposited as dew each night. Two layers laid cross- 
ways formed our bed, and with such accommodations 
we passed our second day and night. 



476 CAHABA. 

But to a person sick enough to be constantly con- 
fined to a comfortable bed and constantly attended 
by a tender, watchful nurse, that little rude, cramped 
shed of canes, with its hard bed of canes, with no 
blankets or other bedding, was a most cheerless place, 
and uncomfortable to an uncommon degree. So, 
after one night in the little place I and a comrade 
looked about for more comfortable quarters, and 
found an empty barn a quarter of a mile away, in 
which were a few armfuls of hay and straw ; next we 
sought blankets. Going to the tent of the quarter- 
master, we asked him to loan us one from a large pile 
in his store tent. He was kind, courteous, and anx- 
ious, apparently, to oblige us, but by some error no 
blanks or stationery had been sent to him. He had 
only arrived that day, and he in a sympathetic way 
told us that if he should allow the blankets to be 
issued without proper receipts he would be obliged to 
pay for them himself, and he could hardly afford to 
lose three to five thousand dollars. " There should, 
certainly should, be proper blanks sent out to-mor- 
row," he said ; " wait, my boys, another day, and then I 
hope I can accommodate you all. You all deserve 
better usage than what I am compelled to give you." 
Out by the side of the tent in which were stored the 
blankets, and acting as a guard over them and other 
property, was a good-natured German soldier. He 
had been indulging quite freely in his national bev- 



FAREWELL TO COMRADES. 



A77 



erage, and had become more than naturally good- 
humored and sympathetic. We sat down beside him, 
and conversing with him as much as possible in his 
native language, soon won a good position in his 
esteem. Then we told him our anxiety to obtain a 
pair of blankets. " Von't the leftenant borrow some 
of dem to you ?" We explained that there were no 
blank papers for us to sign, on which condition only 
could they be obtained. " I drust you, anyway ; you 
dake vat you vant — I drust you." We took a pair and 
went away. The following morning we took back to 
the lieutenant the borrowed pair, and asked him to 
keep them for us until night. We told him that we 
had " appropriated" them the day before from those 
which he had refused us. He was rather surprised, 
but assured us that we could have them each night 
until they could be formally issued to us. 

For five days longer we remained at that camp ; 
then I became so severely ill that a comrade aided me 
into a car going into Vicksburg one morning, and 
bidding adieu to those with whom I had been so long 
associated, and sundering the ties which hardships 
and despair and fears and hopes in common had made 
so strong, I started on the painful journey that re- 
quired weeks for its accomplishment, and had for its 
goal the cherished village home in the bounteous 
Northwest. 



478 C AH ABA. 

ADDRESSES OF ALL EX-CAHABA PRISONERS KNOWN. 



Namk. 

Hiram Allison 

H. R, Andrews 

L. G. Adair , 

Stewart Axley 

James K. Ashley. . . . 

Balzer Appel 

James R. Austin 

W. S. Boon 

E. A. Butolph 

H. J. Buffington 

John W. Brown 

David Bramner 

William A. Beer 

John Burns 

William Boor 

M. L. Bussey 

Haskell M. Cole . . . 

A. L. Call 

J. W. Coates 

Ira F. Collins 

David Chambers. . . . 
Alexander Campbell 

M. Conners 

Ezra Cronkleton, Jr. 

Emery Clark 

E. L. Courier 

E. L. Chapman 

William A. Cronk.. 

George W. Day 

J. R. Dawson 

John Devine 

William C. Dillon.. 

W. A. Fast 

Don R. Frazier 



Town. 



Muncie 

West Union.. . 
Terre Haute. . 

Castalia 

Rushville 

Mt. Carroll. . . 

Syracuse 

Montpelia . . . . 
Cedar Rapids. 
Wetmore. ... 

Muncie 

Muncie 

Ashland 

Rochester. . . . , 

Sandusky 

Waterloo 

Adrian 

Dowell 

Coral . . . 

Sabetha 

Marietta 

Edgerton 

Davenport. . . . 

Dunlap 

Esteline 

Mellette 

Webster 

Lowe 

Jefferson 

Concordia. . . . 
Columbus . . . . 

Hallowell 

Sedalia 

Mt. Carroll... 



County. 



Carroll. 



Douglas. 



Ind. 

la. 

Ind. 

la. 

111. 

in. 

N. Y. 

O. 

la. 

Kan. 

Ind. 

Ind. 

O. 

Minn. 

O. 

Neb. 

Mich. 

Kan. 

Dak. 

Kan. 

111. 

Wis. 

la. 

la. 

Dak. 

Dak. 

Dak. 

Kan. 

la. 
Cloud Kan. 

O. 

Kan. 

Mo. 
Carroll 111. 



Spink 



Spink 



State. 



ADDRESSES OF EX-CAHABA PRISONERS KNO WN. 



479 



Namb. 

T. A. Edgerton. . . . 

Daniel Garber 

R. \V. Galbraith. . . 

S. Graham 

E. A. Gere 

James Gordon 

Stephen M. Gaston. 
Joseph George .... 
George C. Haight. . 

Levi Hartman 

D. Harman 

Jacob Helminger. . . 

L. R. Hawes 

Philip Henry 

W. C. Humphrey. . 

Philip Horn 

Joseph L. Hott. . • . 

John Hubbard 

Dr. R. N. Hall 

Lewis Johnson 

P. M. Kent. Jr. . . . 

H. F. Knight 

Nelson Kirkpatrick, 

H. J. Kline 

William Koehler. . . 

J. L. Lemaster 

Charles Lewis 

George Loveless. . . 

C. Lewis 

J. P. Little 

A. L. Marks 

D. M. Maxon 

Simon McCullough 

L. G. Morgan 

Henry Phelps 



Town. 



Garden City. 
Butler P. O.. 
Indianapolis. . 
Coffeeville. . . . 

Advance 

Mill Brook... 

Sherman 

Alay 

Loudon 

Savannah . . . , 

Defiance 

New Sharon . . 
Sandusky . . . , 

Greeley 

Middleton 

Wooster 

Mansfield 

Hudson 

Chicago 

Muncie 

Brookton 

Waterloo 

Shidler 

Millgrove . . . , 
Rickardsville 

Baker 

West Gate. . . , 
Menominee . , 
Mill P. O.... 

Ipava 

Jewell City. . 

Bay City 

West Point. . 

Findlay 

Joplin 



County. 



State. 



Stoddard 



Scott. 



Ashland 



Mahaska. 



Butler 



676 W. Indiana St. 



Jefferson.. 
Delaware. 



Fayette. 



Decatur. 



Minn. 

O. 

Ind. 

Kan. 

Mo. 

Kan. 

Tex. 

111. 

Mich. 

O. 

o. 

la. 

O. 

la. 

O. 

O. 

O. 

Mich. 

111. 

Ind. 

Ind. 

Wis. 

Ind. 

Ind. 

la. 

Kan. 

la. 

Wis. 

la. 

111. 

Kan. 

Mich. 

Ind. 

O. 

Mo. 



48o 



CAHABA. 



Name. 

William Peacock 
D. A. Prosser. .. 
William Rinker. . 



J. E. Rogerson 

J. W. Rush 

Henry Rouse 

Truman M. Smith 

J. A. Scroggan 

J. P. Skea 

D. B. Summers 

Miles Seeley 

George W. Steward . , 

Joseph Stover , 

Louis Strasser 

George J. Trenaman . . 

W. A. Traxler 

A. C. TuthiU 

R. B. Thrapp , 

W^. Thayer 

R. L. Turner 

John Van Sickle 

M, C. White 

N. M.Wilson 

John L. Walker 

John Windhorst 

Frank Wright 

John Wasson 

W. Scott Whitman 

Benjamin W. Warner. 



Town. 



Muncie 

Kansas City. 
Tassinong. . . 



Washington 

Larned 

Ottawa Lake . . . 
Grand Rapids. . 

Cargill 

Cedar Rapids. . . 
Richland Centre 

Fond du Lac 

Wellington 

Ashland 

Columbus , 

Rochester 

Butler P. O 

Chicago 

Eureka 

Fairfield - 

Oskaloosa 

Scranton 

Hartford 

Marshalltown . . . 

Hamilton 

Washington 

Adrian 

Reno 

New Albany 

Kansas City 



County. 



1331 East i8th St. 



Eastern Div. Pen- 
sion Bureau. 



Monroe 



482 E. Mound St., 
84 Cortlandt St 



317 So. Clark St. , 



Ottawa. 



1201 Grand Ave 



State. 

Ind. 
Mo. 
Ind. 

D. C. 

Kan. 

Mich. 

Mich. 

Mo. 

la. 

Wis. 

Wis. 

Kan. 

O. 

O. 

N. Y. 

O. 

111. 

111. 

Mich. 

la. 

la. 

Mich. 

la. 

O. 

Kan. 

Mich. 

Mich. 

Ind. 

Mo. 



Total, 98. 
Note. — While the above addresses are given for the information of per- 
sons interested, it should be stated that more than one-third of the letters ad- 
dressed as above have been returned to the author by the postal authorities 
marked "unclaimed." As the result of careful inquiry, I estimate that of 
the three thousand persons confined in Castle Morgan during the winter of 
1864-65, more than twenty-five hundred were dead a year later, and less 
than seventy are now alive. 



